Rachel Legerski - Fab Academy 2015

Interface and Application Programming

Week Assignment

The assignment for this week is to write or modify an application that interfaces with an input &/or output device.

Struggles

  1. Just when I thought it could not get anymore challenging! an app?
  2. This took multiple weeks to complete. I used my board from the input week (helloload45 step response). I cut four squares of vinyl copper and soldered ribbon wire to them.
  3. Programming...ugh! This is the reason it took so much time. I tried to do this at home by myself but I really feel more confident when I am working with my team. I also still rely on Scott, our local instructor, to answer my questions as I go along.
  4. I know that the programming will get better and make more sense the more I do it. When I first started, I couldn't write a web page and I am doing that now...so, there is hope for me!

    5. Persistence and Success

    1. Programming the board is more difficult for me. I really have to follow the steps that I write down. I am sure that with practice, this will get easier
    2. After programming, waving my hand over the foil sensors makes the bars on the screen move. Way cool!
    3. Being able to manipulate the code to change the background, font and text sizes was fun. It made me feel successful!

      4. The changing board graphs:

      Design Steps To Follow:

      1. Connect the ISP board to the Hello.Load.45 board through their 2x3 headers. Making sure that you have the pins around the right way and the ground and VCC match up.
      2. Plug the mini usb onto the circuit board and plug into computer.
      3. Use the FTDI cable to provide power to the circuit board. My board is in the lower left of the picture.
      4. Follow the steps to program-cd helloload which changes the directory to where I put helloload. Then-sudo make. This makes an out file and a hex file. Interestingly, we couldn't find the files that the program made but we continued. I entered my password and then sudo python hello.load.45.py/dev/ttyUSB0.
      5. The program loaded. Now when you wave your hand over the foil sensors, the amount of light is measured and reflected on the bar graphs on the computer screen.

        The first picture was taken after I changed the white background to green.

        In this picture, I changed the background color, text sizes and fonts...just because I could!

        Project Files:

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