Rotary/Quadrature Encoder Hi-Res and Vector patterns

Hey all,

I designed these Optical Encoders a few years back for a project I was doing. you can print these on transparency sheets and depending on the pulse rate and accuracy that you need you can cut the outer grids off. for printing use the PDFs or Adobe Illustrator vector file below.

=====>> Here are the High Resolution and source files <<=====

To read these properly you will need to use an Optical (phase) Encoder. OE will let you do single and double precision count as well as detecting the direction of rotation.

I originally intended to use them with photo-interrupt type sensor. while it worked it was not very accurate and had no direction information available, and that sometimes is good enough.
With a slit window and good amplification you can use them with reflection type sensors as well, in which case you might want to print them on white sheets.

Kitchen Island? "yes, we can!"

So, decided to make a hardwood (merbau) kitchen table/island for additional storage and work surface, because why the hell not! :p . garage wasn't the best work space but at the end it worked out.
I can't be bothered with drawing a model of it as it's already done but if you want information or a model drop me a line, I should be able to put something together. (this table is made from off the shelf items sold at  Bunnings)

UPDATE:

Now there are two of these in existence and the original is holding up great after almost 3 years :p 

One of those days....

One of those days (more like everyday nowadays)

Phone backdrops #01

Here are a few backdrops I put together a while ago for my android phone, really simple and abstract

Link for files

Colouring pages #01

Did a bunch of paint bucket colouring out of boredom, nothing spectacular, they need a home so gonna leave them here (blank images are from the interwebz, credit goes to the original artists)

Link for files

Mechwarrior Online (MWO) controler options

Hey guys,

So I have been playing MWO in the past few months and figured I should share my somewhat uncommon setup

so I use four different inputs:

1. Keyboard
   obviously comes handy for in-game chat
   keypad for weapon groups management
     (2 down,4 left,6 right,8 up, 5 select, 0 sequence)
2. Mouse
   targeting
   mouse one and two for weapon groups one and two
   scroll for zoom and mouse 3 for zoom reset
3. Joystick for flight and fire controls
   Logitech Extreme 3D Pro Joystick $70AUD, seen them for $30 on ebay
   B1: weapon group 3
   B2: team IDs
   B3: UAV
   B4: target lock
   B5: air strike
   B6: ECM mode
   Hat up: map
   Hat down: scoreboard
   Hat left: thermal vision
   Hat right: night vision
   Y axis: forward and back movements
   Z axis: torso turn
   also mapped a few rarely used controls to side keys
4. Footswitch for very common control functions
   3 switch foot pedal $37AUD
   S1: jump jets
   S2: arms unlock
   S3: advance zoom

I use the mouse on right hand, joystick on the left hand and both feet on foot pedals. also I replaced the left armrest of my chair with a flat base that lets me put the joystick in it's place. very comfy for long sessions.

considering the number of controls expect a steep learning curve. that said, once you get comfortable it's very nice. don't expect miracles!, these would not improve your gameplay by much, however they did gave me a more natural feel and better sense of immersion. "real" mechs are piloted by joysticks and foot controls afterall! :P

Saving location of icons on your desktop after moving or organising

I generally keep all the stuff that I'm working on or meant to be working on in the near future on my desktop, I also like to organise the icons into groups in various corners of the screen and also in various monitors (I have 3).

Ok, so far so good, but for all that careful organisation of the icons to get saved by windows and come back after a reboot you need to logout/shut-down/reboot successfully and log back in, I find that rather tedious and impractical, besides, what happens if your computer crashes or reboots on it's own? all that effort will go to waste.. (yeah I hardly ever turn my computer off, it usually just crashes after a few days on it's own, aw... I miss linux...) anyhow, in my frustration I stumbled across a rather handy solution to save the modification right after I'm done with them.

You probably already know about the F5 key being the refresh short-cut for windows explorer and most browsers. but sadly a refresh doesn't seem to make windows explorer to memorise the location of the icons on the desktop. you also may or may not know about the "Windows key" on the keyboard, there are a bunch of handy short-cuts associated with it. one combo that seems to have been missed by everyone is: 

WIN + F5 = Refresh Explorer and save state

I usually do a CTRL + F5 before doing the WIN + F5, I hadn't bothered to confirm but I think I does something akin to a "clean refresh" as it's done in most browsers.

One possibility is that ctrl+f5 is the combo that does the save action but have not bothered to test them separately before, if anyone out there cares to test it I would like to know the results.

I have been using the combo for years and it seems to work on all windows versions from XP to Win 7, let me know if it works for you as well.

Intro?

Hello there,

I will be posting a completely random collection of the things I'm working on, things that I found interesting and a jumble of tips and tricks that I found handy.

I live in a bit of a chaos so I'll most likely be a bit erratic and as name suggest "random". I have been meaning to make a blog or web page for years but never got to it due to the same issue of not being available reliably. I guess some order is in the horizon.......pfft...nah, who am I kidding, I love chaos!

Anyhow, I'll try to be useful and post interesting stuff for geeks and backyard hackers.

See you guys around!