I've been sent a 3D camera addon to review - the Svpro SV-2560X3D-001 is a £65 stereo camera designed for Android. It will also work with a Raspberry Pi! It looks a little like a Microsoft Kinect - a single bar with two embedded cameras. The camera resolution is 720p on each lens. It clips on easily to a phone via a padded screw clamp. You need to install a dedicate 3D camera app in order …
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Here's a very simple introduction to getting started with Tweepy - a Python program which lets you access Twitter. This will work on small computers like the Raspberry Pi. Everything here takes place in the Terminal on the Command Line. This should work on Windows and Mac - but I'm using Linux. Get Python Open your terminal or command prompt. Type python You should see something like: …
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I've been sent a couple of Sonoff smarthome gadgets. You can read my review of the S20 WiFi plug socket and the POW in line power controller. Here's a video of me controlling them from my Amazon Alexa: The latency seems a little slow - hard to tell if that's Amazon only relying on US data centres for Alexa skills, or the connection to my home. Once set up, it works well. Oh... but…
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I want to stop someone from following me on social media. In this case, it's not a stalker or harasser - just someone who's presence I don't need in my life. This could be worse - they could be a lot more malicious and I could be in a more vulnerable position. I am positively festooned with privilege - so I don't have to worry about my physical safety, but it's annoying and distressing having…
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The good folks at Sonoff have sent me a bunch of kit to review. See my previous review of the S20 WiFi plug. This is the Sonoff Pow - a WiFi enabled in-line power switch. Set Up Wiring up the Pow is relatively easy. The cover to the terminal block is secured with a simple screw. I found the opening a little cramped - but it's easy to open up the entire unit. Which gives us a full view of …
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In the last couple of months, I've been seeing the ú symbol on British receipts. Why? 1963 - ASCII In the beginning* was ASCII. A standard way for computers to exchange text. ASCII was originally designed with 7 bits - that means 128 possible symbols. That ought to be enough for everyone, right? Wrong! ASCII is the American Code for Information Interchange. It contains a $ symbol, but …
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The good folks at Sonoff have sent me a bunch of kit to review. First up, the S20 WiFi Plug - an easy way to retrofit IoT smarts to your existing appliances. This fills the same niche as the Belkin WeMo but with one crucial difference - it's about half the price. Direct from Sonoff it's US$13 - from Amazon UK the smartplug is £15. The cost of the WeMo is £40. How does it compare to the B…
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I read a Guardian article about an artist who set up an analogue camera in front of their TV, set it to long exposure, and set a movie playing. The result was a rather wonderful collection of images. You can see more of Jason Shulman's works Is there a way to automate this process? Yes! Here's my attempt at a "Long Exposure" of "Taxi Driver". It's not the same as Shulmans's process, but I …
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I recently downloaded an album from Bandcamp. On trying to extract the zip file using Ubuntu, I got the error "File name too long." This is a known problem with Bandcamp. If you have a problem with long filenames in zip files, here's how to fix it. Quick Solution unzip -p -c whatever.zip "filename.ogg" > shortname.ogg That will extract a specific file from the zip and then rename it before …
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Imagine that you are sat, blindfolded, in the back of a taxi. How could you tell if you were being driven by a human or an autonomous vehicle? If you've not read Alan Turing's The Imitation Game, I can highly recommend it. The paper is short, well written, and contains a whole world of ideas. This is where we get the concept of the Turing Test. Can a human be fooled into thinking that the…
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Five years ago, Twitter updated its logo and demonstrated that it could be made entirely of circles. Interestingly, the official Twitter logo doesn't use circles directly. So, here is an SVG I've made which is only circles: Or, without the edges, and no transparency: And the raw code: <svg height="100" viewBox="0 0 100 100" width="100" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"> <circle…
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I was incredibly fortunate that my new employer sent me to a conference in China recently. I can't discuss what I did out there - but I can report on all the delicious food I ate! (NB - I paid for all meals myself!) Being veggie in Beijing was relatively easy. I had a stock phrase "我吃素" (Wo Chi Su - I eat vegetables), and a smattering of tourist level Mandarin. I had recommendations from frie…
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