The EduBuzzer, our hackerspace challenge contribution is finished.

It works!

We gave you some previews and reviews over the past 5 weeks and from time to time we were not sure we could make it in time.

But we did! and boy how we did!!!

Lets start at the beginning 5 weeks ago..

We had a meeting of ~10 people and we gathered ideas what we could build for the hackerspacechallenge.

Various ideas were discussed and after 3 hours of talking we settled with the idea of an interaction device that enables classes to have quizshows.

From there the idea grew into a more generic device that could also be used to play games,

have a multiple choice tests or participate in a survey.

So we had to implement something more flexible.

FAR more flexible that is

The EduBuzzer was born.

"Wow i totally want one of those!!" - Anika, 8 years

It has 4 leds (blue, red,yellow,green), 4 buttons, one RGB led to change the color of the enclosure, a piezo beeper to play sounds and melodies, a RF link and an iButton interface to personalize the devices.

We took great care to only use parts that are widley available and cheap, so that devices can be built for ~20 USD.

There are two versions that provide the same functionality:

1. a very cheap and straight forward arduino shield

2. a complete hardware setup we created from scratch including a 2-layered PCB, a 3D printed enclosure, a lazzzored part in the middle and 4 buttons manufactured using our lathe

Hackgalore aka as technical documentation overview:

The project has a very detailed documentation in our wiki @ http://metalab.at/wiki/HSC2011

We used 5 different programming languages C, Java, Python, Javascript and embedVM which is a virtual machine that runs on the atmel MCU family.

The whole concept is that one EduBuzzer is connected over USB to the teachers laptop/computer acting as a basestation.

On this computer we have a middlewareserver that connects to the EduBuzzer and provides a webserver on localhost that the teacher connects to with his webbrowser.

The different applications and games are implemented in Javascript.

We decided to go for this setup because the design of the applications can be customized and modified with ease using CSS in the browser frontend.

Furthermore Javascript is a *very* popular language and the whole application framework is implemented using a jQuery object model that makes application development a piece of cake.

During development we found out that it was not efficient to send large colorsequences or melodies over the air every time, but rather we send a little program to each EduBuzzer in the beginning of an application and jump to the desired part when the action is required by the application.

Then clifford desided that this is all fun and good but a real virtual machine is way cooler so he implemented the embedVM which is now an official spinof.project of the hackerspace challenge.

Final notes:

The project is (almost) in a working production state but given 5 weeks of developemnt and setting our goals that high the whole setup is still a little wonky.

We will definitely continue work on this project as the resonse from the educational community was very positive and all the kids that played with it so far wanted to take one home.
Also the teachers we spoke to liked the concept because it will make education much more interesting and appealing and new toys are always something that motivates kids to participate in class.

Links:

http://metalab.at/wiki/HSC2011   <- the super duper project documentation  go there if you are interested in this project, tons of documentation is waiting for you!

https://github.com/Metalab/hsc2011 <- software, schematics, 3D printer files, lazzor files, ...

http://metalab.at/wiki/HSC2011/Software/embedVM  <- the super duper spinoff project

The great final video showdown 1/2

The great final video showdown 2/2

We just finished a short introduction video featuring some of the teammembers of the great hackerspace challenge here at the metalab vienna.

Our project is called the EduBuzzer and consists of a set of electronic devices that are connected over a radio link.

These  devices enable teachers and students to interact in new ways bringing  the fun back into the classroom while creating a new dimension of  interaction and participation.

Details, schematics, a lot of  documentation, more videos and photos will be provided in the next  days.. meanwhile you can check out our wiki @ http://metalab.at/wiki/HSC2011

WARNING: our wiki contains german language. beware of the sauerkraut

Yesterday 3 shiney prototype arduino shields arrived.

We now have _5_ devices we can (ab)use for testing the network protocols.

This is great news.

Also the design for the final product PCB is finished and we had it setup on a breadboard successfully today.

Check out the attached pics and video for details.

hack on!

-overflo

The prototyping continues..

we now have

- a full working RGB led

- a buzzer

- 4 leds

- 4 buttons

- the radio module (RFM12b)

- and full iButton support!

yay.. soon.. real soon now..

Hi guys and girls,

I wan't to give you a little introduction to our fine hackerspace. We are based in the wonderful mountain rich country called austria in the heart of europe. And in austria the hackerspace is located in the capital vienna, famous for its rich culture in music and delicious desserts, especially fancy cakes. You can come and visit the space whenever you want. It's completely open for everyone and you don't need to be a member to use the infrastructure.

First a little despcription about our space. We have 200 m² of room for doing great an astounding things, or just to chill a little bit. The rooms are separated in the main room where most of action happens. It's perfectly suited for events, workshops, talks or shows. Then there is the kitchen where you can get some juicy and cold softdrink or cook a tasty dinner.There is also a library where you can grab a book and read it or just work in a quiet environment. The room next to the library is our sound studio equipped with super cool synthesyzers and keyboards. We also have a room for creating electonic devices and other hardware stuff. It's called the whateverlab, and most of the action for this challenge will happen there. You will find in this room some makerbots, a lasercutter, an electronic part inventory and many more gear for hardware handicrafting. The last but not least room is the heavey machinery room where you can do the hardcore stuff like welding. As you can imagine our space provides you with many opportunities to do great things, and many members did like building electonic instruments out of scrap, launching rockets fueled with a salami sausage into the orbit and building robots that mix you the perfect most delicious cocktails.

Our philosophy is to give people the opportunity to create and hack something they normally can't do because the don't have the tools or the knowledge to do it. We also want to embrace the mindset of a hacker to ignite the desire in people to use their skills and potential for creative projects that may help others or are just fun.

To get a little taste of our hackerspace i added some pics. If you want to see even more just go to flickr an look for the group "metalab".

so this is the element-14 community site..

not bad indeed!

most up-to-date information on our contributions to the haclerspace challenge can be found in our wiki

we will try to keep this blog updated at least once a week but time flys and there are things to solder

i also created a soup.io site found on http://hsc2011.soup.io that can be used as an aggregator for all hackerspaces that want to contribute into sharing their progress with a broad audience.

happy hacking!

-overflo