COMPUTING WITH RASPBERRY PI

Finally, I decided to buy a development board to learn electronics and computing in general. After viewing lot's of tutorials on the web, I decided to buy Raspberry Pi.

Reason's to buy Raspberry Pi:

• Not too much expensive
• In the "middle" between Arduino and BeagleBone Black
• Lot's of support available
• Very huge active community 
• Get to understand about computer technology
• Learn Unix operating system

          and many more...

And also best of all, I got the resources to get up and running with Raspberry Pi very quickly:

http://www.lynda.com/Linux-tutorials/Up-Running-Raspberry-Pi/132717-2.html

http://www.pluralsight.com/courses/raspberry-pi-for-developers

Here is how it looks--the first time you log-in:

So if you aren't familiar with command line, there is nothing to worry about. You can execute all of the commands directly from GUI. As you can see there are some of the applications in-built:

• Scratch is a graphical programming language - very much suitable for beginners and kids.
• Midori is the web browser that pi has in-built.
• LXTerminal is the command line utility.
• IDLE and IDLE 3 are python integrated development environments.
• There is also a pi store where you can access apps and tools - paid and free.
• And also there are plenty of games in the start menu and pi store.

So, before doing any physical computing with raspberry pi, it is a good idea to experiment with the UI and have fun playing games!

HOW TO MAKE A BLOG?

Some of my friends asked me about how to make a blog. So I decided to make a video and show them that indeed it is very easy to up and running with google blog.

Steps needed to make a blog:

1. Log-in to your gmail account
2. Search blogger (google it)
3. Just click on the tab labeled "New Blog"
4. Follow the rest of the procedure (as explained in the video below)

Although I didn't made a very good video, explaining every detail (I also did a poor job in making the video as it is) but it would give you enough idea to experiment on your own.

So that's how easy it is to make a blog. Please leave any feedback or suggestions regarding the content.

VIDEO CREATION AND EDITING - USING WINDOWS MOVIE MAKER

Video editing can prove to be an essential skill, especially if you want to produce some high quality video or to give special effects to your video. Although it might seem time consuming at first but once you get used to it, it is just a matter of minutes--really!

WINDOWS MOVIE MAKER:

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-in/windows-live/movie-maker

Making a photo based video:

Making a video based on your photos is really very easy, you just need to navigate to your saved photos and drag it onto the timeline (and expand the timeline so as to allocate proper time to the display of the photo). It is really easy to add additional features like transition effects (by right clicking on the timeline) and other special effects as well. That's it you can now create a photo based video!

Here is the video I made using windows movie maker, it really took me about half an hour the very first time (but if I were somewhat experienced then it really would have taken 1-2 minutes provided I have the contents ready).


SEVEN WONDERS OF WORLD

And video editing follows the same procedure as well: 

1. Just navigate to the desired file location or drag on the movie maker software
2. Drag the video on the timeline
3. Add special effects, re-size the timeline as desired

That's it -- really a simple procedure.

An edited video from Windows Movie Maker:

GETTING STARTED WITH ELECTRONICS, MAKING A 5 VOLT REGULATOR

Making a 5 volt regulator is often necessary when you want to do an electronics project, for example your cell phone and many electronics development board like Arduino, Raspberry Pi, BeagleBone Black require a 5 volt power supply (although in case of development boards, the manufacturers admit that they have included the regulation circuit on board but it is a safer and better idea to feed them with a regulated supply).

Parts needed to make the 5 volt regulator:

1. 9-12 Volt AC To DC transformer
2. 7805 5 Volt Regulator
3. 10 uF polarized electrolytic capacitor (C1)
4. 0.1 uF non-polarized monolithic capacitor (C2)
5. 1 uF polarized tantalum capacitor (C3)

      (Schematic from LTSpice)

Also you would need to make sure to connect proper leads using right polarity (Usually, longer lead is +ve always)

               

(Polarized capacitor)

It would be a better idea to test the output with multimeter and also don't use it too heavily since 7805 chip might get very hot (in case you want to use it heavily, make sure that when you buy 7805 chip, it has proper heat sink attached to it or else you buy the heat sink separately).

Now you would be ready to experiment with the 5 Volt : like playing with LED's, DC Motors and various other digital stuffs!

WELCOME TO THE DARK ART! (Old Website)

This blog is going to be all about the fun and interesting aspects of computing (occasionally, it might deviate slightly, not quite sure yet.). Although it would be highly dependent on my personal preferences but whatever I post, I hope that it will benefit you in some way.
Right from the outset, I would try to make it much more meaningful and easier to understand whatever I am writing. (Forgive me if I don't follow exact syntax rules of grammar!)

Why the title DARK ART?

I was highly inspired and motivated by reading a book by Andre' LaMothe : The Black Art Of Video Game Design. This book is fun to read in the first place and secondly you will learn about electronics & game console design--excellent!