TechnologyIQ

Technology isn't just computers, networks and phones. Technology has always been part of the human experience. All of our ancestors have looked for ways to help them survive and do less work for more gain.  Archive.org has a host of old technology books (from mid-19th to mid-20th Century) available in many formats and on a host of topics. Many of the technologies discussed within these books are being put to use again these days in the back to the land" and homesteading movements. You might even find something that could address one of your own garden or farm issues but has been lost to time and history. Enjoy! --Douglas Historical Technology Books: Technology review by Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1899) - 18 in a series Available in PDF, Text, JPG formats, and more THE NEW ENGINEERING LABORATORIES  The wonderful facilities they offer to the Tech Student of today* Expansion of department 300 per cent. E...

Amazon has released a new version of the Alexa app for Windows 10, and the latest version can be used hands-free. This fixes the biggest complaint Windows 10 users had about the Alexa app, and makes Alexa much easier to use on your PC. In January 2018, Amazon announced that Alexa was coming to Windows 10. This was initially thanks to Windows 10 devices which had Alexa integrated into them. However, in November 2018, Amazon released the Alexa app on the Microsoft Store for everyone. Read You Can Now Use Alexa Hands-Free on Windows 10 via MakeUseOf * A portion of each sale from Amazon.com directly supports our blogs ** Many of these books may be available from your local library. Check it out! An interesting link found among my daily reading

The next version of the Raspberry Pi is here and looks better than ever. The top model is a bit more expensive but a lot more functional than past models, but you can still get the cheaper models for embedded projects and such. The first reviews I have seen are pretty good. — Douglas Three years after the launch of the Raspberry Pi 3 there's finally a completely new model of the credit card sized computer. This time around the hardware is getting a huge update – the biggest since the first version was launched in 2012. Keeping with convention, the new model comes in the guise of the Raspberry Pi 4 Model B and is three times as powerful as the Pi 3. Overall it's over 15 times faster than the original Raspberry Pi and puts in a better performance on the desktop than some traditional budget PCs we've used. Eben Upton, the CEO of Raspberry Pi's commercial trading arm, has described the latest model as "basically a regular PC now", and he's not wrong. The ...

We have an awesome pay what you want bundle in the Geeky Gadgets Deals store today, the Pay What You Want: The Complete Arduino eBook Bundle. The best part about the Pay What You Want: The Complete Arduino eBook Bundle is that you decide how much you want to pay for it. Here is what is included in the bundle: Mastering Arduino Building Smart Drones with ESP98266 & Arduino Arduino for Kids Internet of Things with Arduino Cookbook Arduino Wearable Projects Python Programming for Arduino You can find out more details about this great deal on the Pay What You Want: The Complete Arduino eBook Bundle over at our deals store at the link below. Read Pay What You Want: The Complete Arduino eBook Bundle via Geeky Gadgets * A portion of each sale from Amazon.com directly supports our blogs ** Many of these books may be available from your local library. Check it out! An interesting link found among my daily reading

It is always interesting to see how we did business before the introduction of cheap, portable computers. It also informs how we might better use computers and technology today. — Douglas It is hard to remember that practical computers haven’t been around for even a century, yet. Modern computers have been around an even shorter period. Yet somehow people computed tables, kept ledgers, and even wrote books without any help from computers at all. Sometimes they just used brute force but sometimes they used little tricks that we’ve almost forgotten. For example, only a few of us remember how to use slide rules, but they helped send people to the moon. But what did database management look like in, say, 1925? You might think it was nothing but a filing cabinet and someone who knew how to find things in it. But there was actually a better system that had fairly wide use. Read Before Computers: Notched Card Databases via hack a day * A portion of each sale from Amazon.com directl...

Expect to have longer conversations with your smart speaker soon: Amazon revealed plans at its Re:Mars conference in Las Vegas Wednesday to give its Alexa smart assistant capabilities to carry on longer conversations, and help consumers with services across different providers. Alexa head scientist Rohit Prasad demonstrated the assistant’s new conversational capabilities, dubbed Alexa Conversations, with a video on stage. The video showed a consumer asking for movies that were playing nearby, settle on a film, find showtimes that matched her schedule, buy the tickets, find a restaurant nearby and reserve a table, all without ever having to break the flow of her conversation with Alexa. “We imagine a future where you would be able to naturally converse with Alexa,” said Prasad. “This is a big leap for conversational AI.” Read Amazon Announces Alexa Conversations, Experiences Across Skills via Variety * A portion of each sale from Amazon.com directly supports our blogs ** Man...

This project shows how to make an interactive picture of a dandelion. It starts as a yellow flower with LED's for petals then changes into a white dandelion clock, which can be blown on to make the seeds disperse. It is based on a beautiful artwork by Qi Jie, whose picture was inspired by a single flower design by Jessie Thompson and Zachory Berta. I made mine on fabric and framed it in a tapestry hoop to go on the wall of the Tech and Textiles makerspace in Devon, England, as an example of a beginners project that combines sewing with Arduino. Read Interactive Dandelion via Instructables * A portion of each sale from Amazon.com directly supports our blogs ** Many of these books may be available from your local library. Check it out! An interesting link found among my daily reading

I have been doing more traveling than usual lately, so a VPN system might need to become part of my travel kit. This is one way to build my own that I am going to look into. — Douglas Raspberry Pi enthusiasts or world travellers looking for a secure way to connect to the Internet using a VPNmay be interested in the new Raspberry Pi project published by Ben Stockton over on the Make Use Of website. The project can use either the smaller Raspberry Pi Zero W or the larger Raspberry Pi 3 mini PC depending on your requirements and budget. Ben explains a little more about the inspiration behind the project and why it’s always great to use a VPN while travelling. Read DIY Raspberry Pi VPN secure travel router via Geeky Gadgets * A portion of each sale from Amazon.com directly supports our blogs ** Many of these books may be available from your local library. Check it out! An interesting link found among my daily reading

Few days ago tomshardware.com has published an interesting interview to Raspberry Pi CEO Eben Upton about the fascinating story behind the most famous SBC for makers. In this post Eben Upton has revealed 10 things you may not have known about Raspberry Pi, so let me shortly summarise what he told to tomshardware: Raspberry Pi Was Meant to Recruit 1,000 Kids – Raspberry Pi was originally designed to solve a very simple problem: a lack of computer science students. Upton told that Cambridge went from receiving 600 to 250 applications a year for its comp-sci program, and he felt that offering low-cost computers to kids would get them interested in the field. Maker Community Was a Surprise – Though it was originally designed for kids, the Pi has become extremely popular with adult makers. But when Upton and his team first started designing it, they didn’t have this audience in mind. Raspberry Pi 4: Not Until 2020 Don’t expect the Raspberry Pi 4 until 2020. New models will have more ...

Looking for a reason, or perhaps a way, to dive into the Arduino world. Check out this new kit from Arduino and Google that allows you to explore science using the Arduino and all that it offers. — Douglas The Arduino Science Kit Physics Lab, developed in collaboration with Google, is the first official Arduino kit designed for middle school curriculum. The Arduino Science Kit Physics Lab provides middle schoolers (ages 11 to 14) with a hands-on experience, enabling them to explore forces, motion, and conductivity with their classmates. Students can make their own hypothesis like a real scientist, then check their assumptions, and log data thanks to Google’s Science Journal app — a digital notebook for conducting and documenting science experiments using the unique capabilities of their own devices. The kit, based on the MKR WiFi 1010, includes a range of sensors to measure light, temperature, motion, and magnetic fields, as well as a set of props and full access to online course ...