Exeter Library are holding another Build a robot workshop over 1/2 term.
This half term: Build a robot in a team of 4 to win a prize!
Ages 8+ / 20 places available
£40 for 4 sessions including light refreshments
The sessions are 10 am-1pm:
Mon 26th Oct
Tues 27th Oct
Wed 28th Oct
Thurs 29th Oct
all sessions must be attended for you to win
Tickets available from Exeter library or by phoning 01392 384223
More details on the
Exeter Raspberry Jam blog
Today saw another really good Pi jam in Exeter.
Demonstrations included a Pi based home automation system, which also included a webcam which takes a photo of whoever presses the doorbell and e-mails you a picture.
Led Traffic lights ( I think this is PIC based) – Tom Brough
Toms latest robot (crazy Ivan) this moves around, and can turn randomly and move forward again.
Sadly marco mark 2 had a problem, so was here but just not working as planned.
Pi Ready for eager coders to use.
Lots of people with new Pi’s in need of set up. so I did quite a bit of support here, also minecraft-pi was popular and people seemed to like my modification which drops tnt blocks over grass.
Robots will make another appearance at next weeks Torbay Pi Jam 14th March, Paignton Library from 13:00
This months Pi jam was a real gem, lots of things being demoed and some excellent progress being made with various projects.
Tom, brought along his Marco 2 robot, which if you are following this blog or are a regular attendee of jams. This has now been updated to allow control via a web interface.
More information on this is on the Feb 2015 Exeter Jam write up blog post. So I will let people go there for more info.
Tom also brought along Freddie and after some basic set up this worked fine, following a green ball with his eyes.
Video taken back in July
Doodle bot also made an appearence this is really good as it works without any user interaction and can draw (or try) to draw what it has been programmed to.
We also helped a lady get up and running with her new pi,
Here is the pi being installed from the NOOBS install tool
And a picture of the pi running the Raspbian OS after install.
I also demonstrated my Minecraft Pi coding with python. I will post a video to youtube and put this on my website blog.
We also helped out a user who had an older install of GNU / Linux on his PC (Debian) and wanted a newer GNU / Linux installed so flash player would function properly.
We were unble to help fully however he will be back at the next jam iwth his PC backed up so we can install Linuxmint 17.1
One of our younger members also worked on getting a cluster of computers up and running and thanks to a router / switch donated by Rick at Wifispark he got 2 laptops and my Pi up and running and proved that by sharing the load calculations can be performed quicker. There is a dedicated page for this on the website. Where results will be posted shortly.
We also had a Dan from the TDA drop in to see what was going on with the view on how they can help further and perhaps involve some of the local hi tech companies.
So a BIG thank you for everyone involved today and everyone who came along to support the event. Hopefully next month will be more of the same and perhaps even bigger and better.
We also had Sarah from Inspiring Dreams, Achieving Change, who offered to help promote what we are doing.
The word on the Pi jams IS spreading. which is a good thing.
See everyone on the 14th March 2015 at Paignton Library. 13:00 to 15:00
Here is a poster for the January Pi jam. If anyone is able to print off or display on their website I would be very grateful as this really helps to promote.
With monthly Raspberry Pi jams in Paignton, what would you like to see at these jams. Given they are now more about just raspberry
At present we :
Help on how to get started, what you need to get started, what to buy etc
Show you some of the many add on boards etc available for the pi
Demonstrate projects based on the PI AND Arduino systems (which will hopefully inspire your projects)
Help with getting started with programming or provide advice on the next step for example where to go after using scratch.
We have a few laptops (with Linux)
Help with hardware projects (either stand along or linked to Pi , Arduino and similar devices)
Networking with other users
We would like to encourage young people to network with other young people and advocate collaboration and peer supported learning
We sometimes invite people in, for example in September we had the virtually safe team in who spent some time discussing the concerns of the young people at the jam
We also try and advocate other groups and initiatives that may be of interest to young people: for example Young rewired state, coder dojos, after school clubs. Promote events for adults for example hack4good events or hackathons on services such as geekli.stWe can also help with Linux user group related activities such as install and set up help for Linux. Advice on software or general discussion on related issues.Promote and advocate the use of free and open source software and the work of the Free software foundation Europe..Advocate and promote the new school Computer science curriculum. Enguage with parents, students and teachers in order to facilitate support if needed.Promote STEMnet and Stem activities. Free giveaways such as stickers if available, copies of Linux cd’s again when / where available.
Saturday 6th September 2014 saw another Raspberry Pi Jam in Exeter take place and what a great turnout there was!
At today’s Jam, there was lots of teaching going on with the introduction to Raspberry Pi course going on in the Fab Lab and there was even more teaching going on in the Meeting Room where the rest of the Jam took place. Continue reading
As I am part of the team that run the Torbay Pi Raspberry Pi jam. This is a call out for anyone who would like to either do a demonstration or do a talk at a future pi jam,.
So, If you would like to do a talk or demo or can help in other ways please get in touch,
Just got back from the Raspberry Pi jam in Exeter and have included a few photos below of some of the things on show.
First off is Tom Broughs Excellent Wii remote scratch game, this uses Python to take input from the wii remote via bluetooth and pass it on to scratch, so that the cat can be controlled to move around and catch / eat falling fish.
Still with tom, we had handy (robot arm controlled from scratch) and Bob the robot which as arduino at its heart.
We also had Lego Rovers Devon make an appearance, amazing what you can do with lego and the nxt block
We also helped Chinna out with his buggy made from an old remote control car and raspberry pi.
Chinnas Blog can be found here http://scientistnobee.wordpress.com/2014/07/05/raspberry-pi-spotter/ And a link to github for the code https://github.com/scientistnobee/Raspberry-Pi-Spotter
Scratch game created by one of the young people.
This is the new Raspberry Pi compute module courtesy of Gordon Henderson
Trevor sharp had a Self made IO board on show
Demo of my own Pilte, More info on my website at http://www.zleap.net
Minecraft on the pi
Arduino based distance measuring project using the ultrasonic module HC-SR04
Simons pi powered music chimer.
Fab lab was open, showcasing the range of things that can be made with some of their kit
Another month and another trip up to Exeter to take part in a Pi jam. Again anyone not there missed some really good projects.
Gordon Henderson came along with the fuze box, fuze basic now integrates with minecraft pi allowing you to write programs that directly control the minecraft world.
Fuze box running Minecraft Pi and Fuze Basic.
The Glockenspiel was again there along with the other projects from a local school teacher.
I didn’t demo any of my own projects but did do a quick demo of Sonic Pi and my nested loops program to the lady organising Sidmouth Science week, My main demo on my pi was the Helicopter game created by Tom Brough. Who demonstrated his Bob Robot, (see blog for videos that have been previously created)
Tom was also using a digital picture frame to explain how bob works.
Another project had a LCD display to dispay the local IP address ( I think) of the device on the network
It is the small box on the right hand side with the green display
In all another successful event and looking forward to the Torbay Jam on 12th April, Hope to see lots of families, children, teachers and other school staff there. We need more demos 🙂