TechnologyIQ

It’s common to do a bit of head-scratching when you get your first Raspberry Pi. Sure, it’s a cool bit of technology at an amazing price, but what to do with it? Here at The MagPi, we work hard to stuff your imagination full of ideas that are hopefully accessible to all our readers. Still, we thought it might be fun to take a look at what happens when a maker gets ambitious and decides to go all‑out on their new project. We present some of our favourite advanced Raspberry Pi makes… Read 25 Powerful Raspberry Pi Projects: Part I — The MagPi magazine via The MagPi magazine An interesting link found among my daily reading

  I used math, science and tears to create a snake AI which always wins (sometimes). Watch I Created a PERFECT SNAKE A.I. - CodeBullet via YouTube An interesting link found among my daily reading

The Zoom video meeting and chat app has become the wildly popular host to millions of people working and studying from home during the coronavirus outbreak. Whether you've been using Zoom for years or have only just signed up, there are a number of helpful and fun tips, tricks and hidden features you can find to upgrade your video chatting experience. Here are 13 ways to become a Zoom master. Read 13 Zoom video chat tips, tricks and hidden features via CNET An interesting link found among my daily reading

 My buddy Ken Goldberg, a UC Berkeley professor of robotics, his 10-year-old daughter Blooma, and science communicator Ashley Chase wrote a delightful children's book called How to Train Your Robot! Illustrated by Dave Clegg, the story, about a fourth grade robotics club, is a fun and understandable introduction to how deep learning can help robots gain new skills in the messy, unstructured human world. Thanks to support from the National Science Foundation and UC Berkeley's Lawrence Hall of Science, How to Train Your Robot is available as a free PDF online and student groups can request free hardcopies! Read How To Train Your Robot, a free kids book by an engineer and his 10-year-old daughter via Boing Boing An interesting link found among my daily reading

Apple is giving people stuck at home the chance to try out two of its professional creative applications at no cost. To start with, the tech giant is extending Final Cut Pro X's free trial period from 30 days to 90 days. Users will still have to pay $300 for a license once it's over, but they'll at least have three months to master the video editing application before having to decide whether it's worth the price. Those who want to take advantage of the offer can download the program from Apple's website. And even those still in the middle of their 30-day trial period can get the new version and use it for free for an additional 90 days. Read Apple makes its pro video and audio editing software free to use for 90 days via Engadget An interesting link found among my daily reading

Life looks very different right now as the novel coronavirus has millions around the world stuck indoors. Festivals, clubs, and even house parties are banned in many cities, leaving musicians (and music lovers) housebound and searching for creative outlets. Over the past few weeks, several music companies have responded by offering freebies in order to, as Korg said, provide “a musical way to occupy your mind.” Below, we’ve rounded up an array of apps, plug-ins, sounds, lessons, and even digital audio workstations (DAWs) that are currently free to give tools to musicians and those looking to learn musical skills during the pandemic. A few were already free, but the majority are only free for a limited time. There are tons of deals available, so get ready to hunker down with some new digital toys. Here are some of the top picks, with more to come. Read Here are a bunch of free music apps and sample packs while we’re all stuck inside via The Verge An interesting link found among ...

Today Instagram is launching a new feature to more easily manage who you’re following. The improved follower view makes it easier than ever before to clean up your feed and weed out people you know from high school. FOLLOWING CATEGORIES — The feature, which can be accessed by tapping “Following” on your profile, splits your followers into a few categories, including “Least Interacted With” and “Most Shown in Feed.” The categories use data from your Instagram activity for the last 90 days. Read Instagram’s latest feature will help you figure out who to unfollow via Input An interesting link found among my daily reading

The next time you load up a YouTube video, it probably won't look as sharp as you'd normally expect, at least at first. From today, videos will start playing in standard definition by default for the next month, though you can still bump up the resolution manually from the settings. It follows a similar measure YouTube and many other streaming platforms have adopted temporarily in Europe to lower their bandwidth usage amid the coronavirus outbreak. EU regulators asked them to make the change to ease internet congestion in the region for the time being. Read YouTube will limit video quality for everyone by default for a month via Engadget An interesting link found among my daily reading

Download this video Apple is currently giving out freebies to Books users in the US. The next time you launch the app, you'll see a notification inviting you to "explore free books, read-alongs for kids, cozy mysteries, and audiobooks for the whole family." Tapping on the message will lead you to a featured collection where you can select one book or audiobook from a variety of genres. You can also pick a novel from the company's "First in a Series, Free" section. Read Apple is giving free e-books and audiobooks to people in the US via Engadget An interesting link found among my daily reading

It’s one thing to be able to transcribe music from a flute, and it’s another to be able to make a flute play pre-written music. The latter is what [Abhilash Patel] decided to pursue in the flute player machine, an Arduino-based project that uses an air flow mechanism and PVC pipes to control the notes produced by a makeshift flute. It’s currently able to play 17 notes, just over two octaves starting from the lowest frequency of E. In order to play songs, the tones have to either be directly coded and uploaded to the Arduino, composed with a random note generator, or detected from a microphone. While a real flute can be used for the machine, [Patel] uses a PVC flute, constructed with some knowledge of flute playing. Read An Arduino-Based Flute Playing Machine via Hackaday An interesting link found among my daily reading

Read These 6 soft synths are absolutely free via MusicTech An interesting link found among my daily reading

As the entire world shuts down due to coronavirus outbreak, millions of people across the world are working from home. This has led to an increase in the use of video calling and conferencing services like Zoom, Skype, and Teams. Zoom, however, has emerged as the most popular choice and has seen a massive surge in users. If you are using Zoom for video meetings, check out some handy tips and tricks to make your life a bit easier during this pandemic. Compared to Microsoft Teams, Skype, and other video calling services, Zoom is being preferred by many because it is very straightforward to use and offers a number of useful features. If you are holding important video meetings with a lot of people, the additional features that Zoom offers almost make it a no-brainer. However, most people are likely using Zoom for the first time and are not aware of its entire features and how to get the most out of the video calling service. To get you up to speed on how to use Zoom to its maximum pot...

Read Here’s how to change your Zoom background via Mashable! An interesting link found among my daily reading

With social distancing forcing more people to telecommute or take classes online, many people have lost access to the Microsoft Office app provided by their workplaces or campuses. That’s left a lot of people without a reliable way to continue their work as normal. And since a one-time Office 365 install costs $150—or $70-$100 annually for multi-device access and account sharing—Microsoft Office is a pricey purchase if you don’t normally work from home. Luckily, many Office programs also have free web-based versions available to anyone with a Microsoft account. The available web apps include: Read How to Access Microsoft Office for Free While Working From Home via Lifehacker An interesting link found among my daily reading

New Facebook is here, but a new chronological News Feed is not—not without a clever little hack, that is. You can test out Facebook’s redesign right now if you pull up your desktop browser, click on the drop-down arrow in the upper-right corner of the UI, and select “Switch to New Facebook,” like this: Read How to 'Force' a Chronological Feed in Facebook's New Design via Lifehacker An interesting link found among my daily reading

Use your down time to explore something new and old at the same time. Check out the MiniMoog app for free for a limited time. — Douglas     In a bid to spread “positivity, creativity and expressivity” in these difficult times, Moog Music has announced that it’s giving away its Minimoog Model D iOS app for free. An official emulation of the most famous synthesizer of all time, this runs on both iPhone and iPad, and usually costs $14.99/£14.99. Writing on Facebook, Moog says that it hopes that the app will offer: “A moment to slow down, appreciate our innate strength, and experience the uplifting power of sound. A chance to share the way we hear the world around us…” Now able to run as an AUv3 plugin in a suitable host, the Model D app delivers an authentic take on the Minimoog’s sound and features and looks and feels just like the real thing. Moog’s announcement follows Korg’s decision to give away its iKaossilator dynamic phrase synth app for iOS and Android. It’s not clear how...

Historical Technology Books - 49 in a series - MIT Technology Review 1918-01   What was the state of technology and science when our last pandemic struck? This January 1918 edition of the MIT Technology Review gives you a little insight into that era. — Douglas     Down this entire publication from Archive.org in a variety of formats  

  Rob made an interactive Dungeons and Dragons table using a Raspberry Pi and an old TV. He thought it best to remind me, just in case I had forgotten. I hadn’t forgotten. Honest. The table connects to Roll20 via Chromium, displaying the quest maps while the GM edits and reveals the layout using their laptop. Yes, they could just plug their laptop directly into the monitor, but using the Raspberry Pi as a bridge means there aren’t any awkward wires in the way, and the GM can sit anywhere they want around the table. Read Rob's Raspberry Pi Dungeons and Dragons table - Raspberry Pi via Raspberry Pi An interesting link found among my daily reading

Many have been asking what the implications of the current Covid-19 pandemic are going to be on additive manufacturing as an industry. The relationship between coronavirus and 3D printing is not entirely clear, mostly because we are very far from understanding what the long, medium and even short terms implications of the pandemic are going to be on global supply chains. Additive manufacturing may be able to play a role in helping to support industrial supply chains that are affected by limitations on traditional production and imports. One thing is for sure though: 3D printing can have an immediate beneficial effect when the supply chain is completely broken. That was, fortunately, the case when a Northern Italian hospital needed a replacement valve for a reanimation device and the supplier had run out with no way to get more in a short time. Read Italian hospital saves Covid-19 patients lives by 3D printing valves for reanimation devices via 3D Printing Media Network An inter...

Facebook just expanded 3D photo posting to phones that don’t actually capture depth data. Using the magic of machine learning (i.e. artificial intelligence), Facebook taught a neural network how to “infer 3D structures from 2D photos,” even if those photos were taken with a single lens camera. Read Facebook says its 3D Photos feature, which retroactively converts 2D photos to 3D using neural nets, now works on photos taken with single-lens cameras (DL Cade/PetaPixel) via Techmeme An interesting link found among my daily reading

After being inspired by RYNO motors and other self balancing scooters from Segway, I always wanted to build something similar. Thinking for while, I decided to build a Self Balancing Robot using Arduino. This way I would be able to grasp the underlying concept behind all these scooters and also learn how PID algorithm works. Once I started building, I realised that this bot is a bit of a challenge to build. There are so many options to select from and hence the confusions start right form selecting the motors and remains till tuning PID values. And there are so many things to consider like type of battery, position of battery, wheel grip, type of motor driver, maintaining the CoG (Centre of gravity) and much more. Read DIY Self Balancing Robot using Arduino via Circuit Digest An interesting link found among my daily reading

Historical Technology Books - 48 in a series - MacWEEK Vol 07 Num 01   This may not seem that “historical” but flipping through these pages show that 1993 computing was a world away from where we are only 27 years later. Local area networking was happening but not one Internet URL is listed. That is still a bit in the future for most companies. For me, looking at these pages brings an odd sense of recognition. Everything seems familiar but in the hazier parts of my memory. Enjoy your own walk down memory lane. — Douglas      

# 43 - The Sounds of Computer Games LoadingThe Boring Talks Society & Culture Listen on Apple Podcasts James Ward introduces another curious talk about a subject that may seem boring, but is actually very interesting.... maybe. The clunk and click of the datasette machine. The white noise of the tape loading. The strange and compelling soundtrack of the loading music. The author and video games journalist Keith Stuart remembers the forgotten whirrs and clicks that made up the soundtrack of his youth. Listen To The Boring Talks: # 43 - The Sounds of Computer Games Loading An interesting link found among my daily reading

A great use for an inexpensive computer like the Raspi — especially now that the Steam Link has been discontinued. — Douglas   Remember the Steam Link, the $50 box from Valve that let you stream games from your PC to any TV in your house? The hardware has been discontinued, but Steam Link is still around as an app for iOS, Android, and—perhaps most intriguingly—the Raspberry Pi. We've discussed how to stream games to your phone and tablet with the Steam Link app, and it's great—you get the mobility of playing anywhere in the house, but your gaming PC does the heavy lifting, sending the video feed to any device on the network. If you want to stream those games to a TV, though, the Raspberry Pi is a perfect, inexpensive solution for doing just that. And if you have a Raspberry Pi running RetroPie, Steam Link is built in as an experimental add-on. Read How to Use a Raspberry Pi and Steam Link to Stream PC Games to Your TV via PCMAG * A portion of each sale from Amazon....