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Here we like anything fantasy and Sci-fi and blog  with a healthy amount of satire

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Physical computing assignment 2

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Assignment 1 for physical computing

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Semester 1 Studio Project so far

to start with, its been a wee while since i posted. That’s pretty high on the list to get better at, it was meant to happen on Wednesday but I also found out that day that I was moving house so it went to the bottom of the LONG list that needed to be done.

But now, onto the show.

The main premise of our plan started out with making fidget toys out of recycled materials so that they can contribute to the circular economy. An added benefit was that we would be able to learn more prototyping skills and spend some time at the art and design labs.

We initially wanted 3 different kinds of toy that were made out of recycled materials. The first one was a marble in a fabric tube, the second was a fidget cube style toy and the third was never decided upon. We quickly decided to purchase one of the more popular new fidget toys to give ourselves some frame of reference too.

Over the next few days we used the purchased fidget toys and the few marble prototypes we had to give ourselves an idea of what we liked and what we didn’t. we all trended towards liking the same aspects of the toys, we liked a mix of noisy things and quiet things and typically hate any aspect of the toy that rolled with friction.

After that our next step was to do some research into 2 main aspects; 1. why is making recycled fidget toys important? 2. what sort of recycled materials would we be considering?

1. 1. why is making recycled fidget toys important?

a. They help people relieve stress and concentrate

b. People who fidget tend to wreck whatever theyre fidgeting with over time

c. Fidgeting helps with learning and memory

d. The contribution to a circular economy

2. 2. what sort of recycled materials would we be considering?

a. For a marble toy we would have used off-cut/misprint fabric

b. For the plastic based toys we were going to focus on using the more widely recycled plastics in NZ

i. HDPE

ii. LDPE

iii. Polypropylene

Soon after this we went through somewhat of an existential crisis because we lacked a ‘wow’ factor of our idea, it felt more like an incremental betterment of fidget toys in general rather than something new and exciting. However after some feedback from our lecturers we had developed the idea more, the new and improved plan was to make fidget cubes modular so that you can pick and choose what you want to fidget with.

The next 2 phases of our plan were to imagine up how the sides of our future cube would look along with making a proof-of-concept prototype prior to a group feedback session with our class.

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The little RC car that had a fancy toaster on it - aka the Perseverance rover

The Perseverance rover is a lot of things to a lot of people, it the devotion ofmany years of countless peoples lives, it is the fanciest RC car in the solar system (in my opinion) and it is as its name trumpets to the cosmos, a symbol of humans perseverance.

(does anyone else struggle to spell that?)

Specifically for this blog post, i learnt about the little "toaster sized" object attached to it.

This is the MOXIE or the Mars Oxygen In-situ Utilization Experiment. what it does is take carbon dioxide out of the maritan atmosphere, splits off an oxygen and emits the byproduct carbon monoxide into the atmosphere.

This is the first use of it on mars so far and in the hour it was operational it produced 5.4 grams, this equates to about 10 minutes of normal activity for an astronaut. while this doesnt sound like much, this is only the first test and the point of the rover is to test out technology and gather data so that the information can be used in the future.

The scientific process used all over the world is frightfully close to the creative process we're being taught in class so this being NASA's steps towards something greater is brilliant to see. not to mention all the other things the rover has, like the mini helicopter "ingenuity" or how it 'poops' out samples of the rocks and soil it travels across.

why is this so cool you might ask, why does this make an impact?

well, a potential application of the MOXIE is to scale it up and take that version to mars to produce oxygen for more rocket fuel and for astronauts to breathe. especially when it becomes more efficient they could potentially have their own personal MOXIE's so that they can run around with abandon all over mars! (probably not the last bit, but the sci-fi nerd in me can dream)

https://mars.nasa.gov/mars2020/spacecraft/instruments/moxie/

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Programming is finally feeling organised.

I crave organization in some things and so far programming has been a pain for me because it just ended up being an extremely long chain of code that felt like it could be shorter.

INTRODUCING CLASSES.

the 2nd picture features the 'class' aka the plans for a ball that will move around, bounce and change each time the code is ran.

the 1st picture is essentially filling in the desired info into that ball and can be replicated however many times desired.

while this is extremely satisfying i've struggled with things being organized differently to how i'm used to now, but i will persevere.

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Hack your own board game: Slap Attack!

This started out by us learning how to use a makey makey and about papertronics in class, the intent of the exercise was to attempt to make a more interactive using the makey makey or papertronics, or both.

The game we chose seemed like it would be a relatively straightforward one to begin with. it was called alphabet bingo and consisted of a spinner, some counters and some bingo cards. We came up with some ideas relatively quickly; a fitness game, a roulette style game, altering the game to make it more fun but to still aim it at kids. we ultimately went forwards with the roulette game in mind as the others didn’t seem appropriate for our target audience of the class. this morphed into a reactions game as we went more because the betting idea was getting too complicated and was taking away from the 'hacking' aspect of the task.

Our plan was to have the spinner light up a different coloured light depending on which section of the board it landed in and only certain sections would actually turn on the LED's, furthering the reactions aspect as you would be deducted a life for performing the action incorrectly. this consisted of us having most of the wiring on the underside of the board and the power traveling along the spinner and back into the board, lighting up the LED that was connected to where the spinner stopped.

we started by making our own board our own board out of paper to experiment on as to not potentially wreck the final product. This provided us with mixed results as while it allowed our initial ideas to be met with success, they were successful (quite literally) on paper, NOT on the thicker board.

We failed to account on the extra few millimetres of material which slowed down the spinner massively and meant it could rarely land where we needed. The more pressing issue was the connection issue through the spinner which we were never able to get working consistently. we ended up asking for help and we were directed to the idea of a 'slip ring' which we tried to replicated but it was just too complicated and we ran out of time.

While the connection issue was a massive issue, it wasn’t all bad. we did make circuits that worked (without the spinner) and while some of the team was struggling with that, we made a working, better looking non-electrical version for people to play in class which was a resounding success, with people at the table constantly.

while it ended up being a board game with mixed success, it taught me a lot. we took too much time with preliminary planning on the paper, what’s more while other teams opted to use actual wiring for some aspects of their games, I pushed to keep ours ONLY in the field of papertronics which massively hamstrung us. our biggest mistake though was taking too long to ask for help, we knew the spinner would be the biggest issue and should have gone for help at the concept stage rather than with a day to go.

what would I do next time? attempt to identify our Marshmallow sooner so we would have more time to address the issue. aside from that we made an interactive board game that the class enjoyed playing.

Can’t wait to see what we do next!

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On Victory and Defeat: The Marshmallow Challenge - a satirical reflection of myself.

Personally i maintain that a small amount of tape in the corners of our winning structure shouldn't disqualify us from the extraordinary, and elusive prize that was the packet of fruit burst and half a packet of marshmallows but i'll accept the loss with modesty and grace.

The first of many lessons it taught me was impromptu speeches have a way of sounding very smug, and thats not ideal. especially when in the midst of it your unintended cheating is brought to light.

All jokes aside the teaching tool is a brilliant one.

It teaches you about teamwork and how you cant have deadweight, if you do have it its a great time to take that person aside (maybe after the challenge, you ARE on a clock) and mention that it wont suit them later in life to act like that.

It teaches that a few minutes planning can save you an awful lot of heartache in the future: we took 8 of our 18 minutes to plan how to put our tower together and even after the challenge when we stuck it all together without the cheating tape it still stood taller than everyone elses'. looking around the room, the people with non-standing towers were the ones i had seen going straight into it without a vision of what the tower could be.

In concert with planning comes testing. test, test, test, we tested each aspect of our tower prior to put it together. while others may have done so, they neglected to bring the marshmallow into the mix until the end stages, which as our lecturer pointed out was a bad idea. you need to keep all the potential issues in mind all the time throughout a project, just because you think it wont affect you now you cant just forget about it. which brings me to the most important lesson.

Expect the unexpected. the marshmallow was the unexpected in this case for many, they didn't expect it to weigh a lot relative to the strength of spaghetti. Try and finish things in an appropriate amount of time so that you have time to make sure everything works fine and is in accordance with the rules. while you cant necessarily know what unexpected problems might arise, nor can you effectively plan for something you don't know about, giving yourself time is a buffer for that failure.

That being said, the main takeaway should be don't accidentally cheat. it makes you look silly.

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To put it frankly, I found this exercise tough.

Even in writing this I'm really not sure why, to start with I thought it was an illogical way of thinking but I realised through some thought that it’s a way of considering all the factors that make up an issue or event. Furthermore, I remembered that this is how to analyse events in history and how important this way of thinking is for more than just that domain, it’s all the same way of thinking but labelled more appropriately.

but now, onto the main event:

1. What is the event/thing you have chosen?

The main premise is that people like honey, which comes from bees. so, what do we do that influences the declining bee population?

2. Patterns - What are the patterns/habits associated with that event/thing?

Positive patterns:

more and more humans are aware of our adverse effect on nature around us and want to change people are going out of their way to alter their surroundings and actions to be eco-friendly (as evidenced by websites like: https://www.ranchandfarmproperties.com/blog/how-to-increase-your-local-bee-population) negative patterns:

people are the driving force in climate change which is altering the habitats of bees and other animals overpopulation of humans is stressing our food production, leading to deforestation to increase farming (among other reasons)

3. Structure - What has influenced the patterns?

laws have been made restricting the use of some chemicals in sprays that can either kill bees or weaken future generations.

As the human population continues to grow, we need more food to sustain it. This leads to a push for more land for agriculture and for that agriculture to be more” efficient”.

As an increasing number of humans live in an urban area, there is a greater desire to see their slice of it having a natural and healthy feel and so plants and wildlife thriving gives the desired effect.

4. Mind Models - What assumptions, attitudes, values and beliefs that underly the structure?

Most of humanity is striving to become more eco-friendly and a massive part of that is conservation of environment and species so it is an easy step to try to mitigate the impact we are having from small things like changing what soap we use to using biodegradable plastics in shipping all around the world.

however, the issues that come up immediately are staggering, some examples are as follows:

3rd world countries find it harder as they just don’t have as many resources as more developed nations and need to put the needs of their citizens first. climate change is often felt hardest in these countries as they cannot combat it as effectively, (e.g.) creating droughts, leading to a lack of food and access to fresh water which impacts both humans and wildlife. Large companies exist to make money and becoming more eco-friendly affects their profit margin. An infamous example of this is Nestle, they consistently use a staggering amount of water every year, in some cases this even deprives people of clean water to drink or wash in. While it does seem like an overwhelming prospect, a key to staying positive and on the right track is looking for the people making a difference.

Treaties between countries like the Paris agreement signed in 2016 lay out a set of guidelines and targets to aim for but its people like Greta Thunberg and Felix Finkbeiner that help keep the issue in our eyes while also setting up organisations to plant trees or protect various wildlife. counties are using tourism to make it clear to more people worldwide that the climate is changing and not for the better. some are even taking more polarizing steps like legalising heavily controlled trophy hunting to funnel more funds into conservation efforts whilst also providing a boon to the surrounding communities. While Bees and honey were the start of this, the bigger message is humanity taking more than we give back. However, we are slowly turning in the right direction and its better late than never.

here are some websites I used form some research:

https://www.ranchandfarmproperties.com/blog/how-to-increase-your-local-bee-population https://bit.ly/3rsbxtA https://ourworldindata.org/land-use#total-agricultural-land-use https://www.un.org/press/en/2019/gaef3516.doc.htm https://bit.ly/2Oac19e https://wwf.panda.org/discover/our_focus/wildlife_practice/species_news/wwf_and_trophy_hunting/

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This video really struck a chord with me. collectively I've taught people how to sail for 10 years. a massive part of that is how a sail and boat works and how you can use that to go faster. a common explanation more gears to adults is that its essentially a soft aircraft wing (especially now with the current Americas cup), i would then go on to talk about how the air flows around it and how that pushes you in the direction you wish to go but i digress.

The connection that i rarely brought up is the link to bird wings and fish, how they were the precursors to my examples and how (lets be honest) MUCH BETTER at it than we are! It does make me regret my lack of that addition, considering i did most of the teaching in Qatar which is a wee bit of a desert it would have been nice to get my students more interested in the wildlife we had there.

Either way, this is food for thought and something i aim to keep in mind in the future.

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Programming is like a puzzle but with maths I've forgotten

after only teaching people hands on things for a while now programming really scratched that problem solving itch that i forgot i had. it really felt like slipping on an old pair of shoes that you had forgotten about in your wardrobe. 

The difference being that I've never done it before in my life.

something that really stumped me was Q8 in the tutorial provided, I quickly realised what i would have to do and where the triangles that i needed to draw were but the placement took a WHILE. This is the maths i forgot, i ended up just inching the corners over bit by bit until i got the correct position. its safe to say that this will definitely be a question for class time.

aside from Q8 it was all smooth sailing, the hello zoog moving was a bit of fun trying to visualize where it should all be moving and while giving I'm a party hat didn't quite work as intended I'm still happy i attempted it.