York Chocolate Story - A Delicious Place to Go

We went to York Chocolate Story today. It's an exhibition in York that tells the story of chocolate. So its name really makes sense. Its also very good. We had a genial guide who talked us through the history of chocolate makers in the region.

Lots of names that were huge in chocolate and sweets were based around York. (My claim to fame is that for many years the laser marking machine that put datestamps on Kit-Kats was powered by software what I wrote).

Anyhoo, if you are looking for a well put together little tour and you fancy making your own chocolate bar, or you've got kids, I can strongly recommend it.

Free Zinio Magazines for Lumia Owners

Most of the flat surfaces in our house are covered with magazines. Every now and then we have a clear-out, and every now and then I want to read an article that I've chucked in the bin. So, apart from the fact that they are the absolutely best way to read anything, magazines aren't working as well for me as they could.

This weekend I wanted to read a camera review from a copy of the Amateur Photographer magazine  that I hadn't bought when it came out a while back. So I took a look at getting an online copy. Of course I could get it from the Apple store, but that would tie me to Apple products, and I don't use my iPad enough to have it charged and ready to go at any given time. 

So I ended up downloading Zinio onto my Lovely Lumia 1520 and then buying the magazine from them. Zinio is available for lots of platforms, which means I should be able to read it on any device, including my Surface Pro 3 when it comes. (such excitement)

The app and the purchasing experience were pretty smooth, although I was a bit confused when I was asked to pay in dollars. Turns out that because a while ago I told my Lumia it was american to get Cortana to work in the UK, all the apps think they are in america too. 

This actually works very well because at the moment Zinio are doing three month's free subscription to three magazines for american Lumia owners who join up. In other words, if you have a US Lumia you can get a whole bunch of free magazines, including Popular Mechanics, a really interesting US magazine that doesn't seem to have a UK counterpart. 

The reading experience on the phone is not as good as a proper magazine, but then putting ten magazines in your pocket is tricky too. I'm not sure if I'll go over to reading all my magazines on phone and tablet, but given that this would mean I could read all the old issues really easily, it is quite tempting. 

What I really, really, want though is some way that I could convert my printed paper into an electronic licence. I'd be quite happy to pay a small fee (say fifty pence or so) to be able to access the digital version of a magazine that I'm about to throw out. This could be activated by scanning a barcode in the publication, and it needn't go live until a couple of months after the magazine is published. 

3D Printed Winterfell

I'm not a fan of Game of Thrones. But I do quite like 3D printing. Our 3D printerns found a really superb 3D model of Winterfell, which is apparently a location in the program. They used the departmental Ultimaker 2 to produce a lovely version of it, so I had a go at getting Una, my home made Ultimaker 1 to print the model. And I'm very pleased with the results, which you can see above.

The great thing about this is that it really doesn't look very 3D printed. It just looks like a little model.  Looking at the picture I need to do a bit of tidying up, but the fundamentals are very solid. 

In terms of comparing an Ultimaker 1 with an Ultimaker 2 the most noticeable difference is that the Ultimaker 2 seems to be better at retraction. This is when the printing filament is pulled back into the print head prior to a move. The printers do it so that they don't leave strings of excess printing material between features on model. Una is a tiny bit more messy than the Ultimaker 2. This is probably due to the slightly larger size of the heated head. 

But overall I'm well pleased with this. 

A Cunning Use for Screen Shots

This picture is not particularly relevant to the post, but  Hull Station is just over to the right, and I don't want to show you any of my booking codes....

I'm not sure I'm the only person who does this, but I don't think everyone does, so I thought I'd mention it. You quite often find things on your phone that you want to "bookmark". This happens to me when I need to use that email with the magic sequence of characters that will unlock a rail ticket delivery from the machine in Hull station.  I don't like having to open the email, scroll to the right bit and then enlarge the characters so that I can read them. Particularly if there are a bunch of people waiting behind me. 

So what I do now is open the email, zoom it so that it just fills the screen how I want, and then take a screenshot of the phone display. This is really easy to find later and has exactly the data that I want, with no messing at all. Once I've picked up the ticket I can then erase the picture, ready for the next one. 

Works for me.

Getting a Galileo

I've been a great fan of embedded computers for ages. I love the .NET Micro Framework, Gadgeteer and Arduino. And now there is another device to play with, the Intel Galileo. It looks a bit like an Ardunino and it has pins in all the right places to be an Arduino. But actually it is a rather powerful computer based on the new Intel Quark chip.

You can program it in the same way as you would an Arduino device, but what I'm really interested in doing is harnessing all that full on programming power on the device. I've ordered one, and I'm looking forward to playing with it when it gets here. 

One Final Wrestle....

We had our final wrestling session with the teachers tonight. Next week we are having our Three Thing Game@School event with a whole bunch of folks coming into the department from local schools to try their hands at writing Python games. We've made a template game (see above) for them to get started with and yes, it does involve cheese. And crackers.

You can find the resources and the sample games here. 

What are your skills?

We had a meeting with the folks from the Careers and Appointments part of the university today. We were talking about plans for the future, and building on the Careers and Networking event that we had earlier in the year. There's some interesting things coming down the tracks...

Anyhoo, at one point the conversation turned to internships and interviews, and apparently one of the things that you need to have when you are being quizzed for a post is a good solid answer to the question "What are your skills?".

Mentioning your certificate for swimming a width or your high scores in the cycling proficiency test will probably not cut it at this point, neither will going "Meh" and shrugging, so it is worth thinking about what you would say, and how you would back it up. Lines like "I can write programs" are all very well, but you would probably do better if you put the point into a good solid context. Tell them what you made with that skill. Remember that you are actually being given the chance to say nice things about yourself at this point, so be prepared to do just that.

And remember that things like being able to work well in a team, and talk to customers are skills of a sort, and very sought after by potential employers.

Oh, one tip though. Don't tell them that you can do something that you really can't. Claiming a mastery of Python might sound like a hip and happening thing to do, but you might get hit instantly with a really gnarly question about the language.....

Sunday Hexapod

Spent yesterday afternoon watching Colombo and assembling the legs for a hexapod. As you do. Spent some of today putting the servos on the base, next thing to do is attach a battery pack and see what we can make it do...

Wide Angle Open Day

We had another open day today. Two talks, two great audiences. Thanks for coming folks.

I hope you enjoyed your day with us and had a good journey home. 

The weather was a bit grey at the start, but by the end of the morning we had the sun out and the campus was really coming to life. 

I took the camera with the fat lens and wandered around taking a few photographs.

The flower beds are looking good at the moment.

Mmmmm. Burgers.

C4DI Hardware Hacking

Last night we had our monthly Arduino hardware hacking session at C4DI. Lots of the regulars were there and one person even brought her long-bow along. Which was a highly impressive piece of wood. 

The theme of the evening was Sci-Fi movie effects, using programs to make whooshes beeps and all kinds of space age noises. You can find out what we got up to (and even have a go yourself) by grabbing the lab sheet from here).  Great fun was had.

I brought along my latest purchase, an Arduino powered pen pushing robot that you can pick up from RoboSavvy for the amazing sum of 18 pounds. Peter and I had enormous fun building it, particularly when we (or more accurate I) wired the motors the wrong way round and had the robot printing perfectly - but from right to left). However, with a bit of adjustment we got it out of "arabic mode" and managed to get it printing properly.

Microsoft 3D Model Repair Service

One of our "3D Printerns" (students who are spending 8 weeks in the department over summer working on 3D printing) was using this today. It reminded me that I really ought to tell the world about it.  (like my blog is some kind of public service or whatnot.....)

Anyhoo, one of the problems with making 3D models is that sometimes you get bits of data in there that just don't make sense from a 3D point of view. Elements can intersect in odd ways or you might get tiny holes in meshes. These imperfections can cause all kinds of problems when you try to move from a model to a physical artifact.

Normally you need a person to go through and tidy the model it up, but Microsoft have a free, cloud based, service that will just accept your models and tidy them up for you. It's all free, and very useful. You can find it here.

Finding out my "Hacked to Properly" Ratio

Spent quite a big chunk of this evening discovering that code you write during a GameJam is not actually the most solid of stuff. I've reached the point where I'm piling dirty hacks on top of horrible code to try and get something almost working. Oh well, it looks like the time for a total rewrite is here.

The good news is that I can take all the ideas and stuff over to the new design. The bad news is that I'm going to have to do it. Mind you, at the end I can probably work out my "Hack to Properly" ratio. This is the ratio of time it takes to hack something together vs the time to do a proper job. The code took around a day to write first time. Lets see how long it takes to write the new one.....

MVP Renewed

I'm really pleased that I've just been made an MVP again for another year. And this year there's been a change in that Windows Phone MVPs (which used to include me) have now been merged with the Windows Platform Development group.

So I guess that means I've finally made it onto the big screen......

Make a Photobook

If you've just had a wedding, christening or some other noteworthy event, then you might want to think about making a book about it. It's never been so easy to take pictures these days, most smartphones have pretty good cameras built in, but I rather miss the experience of seeing my work on paper. I can print out pictures if I want (and I do) but I'd never really thought about making a book.

However, last week I uploaded a bunch of shots to photobox, clicked a few buttons (a surprisingly small number) and paid a few quid for what has turned out to be a very nice souvenir of the occasion.

The book arrived today and I really like it. The printing quality is just like a "proper" publication, as is the heft and feel of the item itself. I paid a little bit extra for the "lay flat" spine, which means that we can use it in a proper "coffee table" role. The cost was not excessive. I judge the price of everything in video-games, and we managed to get two books printed and posted to Hull for less than the price of a game. 

If you have done something special, or interesting, then making a book about it is actually very easy. The company we used also has an amazing repertoire of pictures, posters, phone cases, mugs and the like which can be customised with artwork.

If you are a student who is not sure what to get mum for christmas, a personalised book that tells the story of your last semester might be a good plan. Although I'd not advise you to put every picture you take into it.....

Windows Phone, Wedding Lights and Bluetooth

Windows Phone connected Wedding Lights. Eight synchronized lights which can be controlled over Bluetooth. Each light contains an Arduino processor and a 16 NeoPixel ring.

I've finally finished it. I was going to write an article about my Windows Phone Controlled Wedding Lights. But instead I thought I'd do something different. So I fired up Adobe Premier and I made a video about them instead. It only lasts a couple of minutes, but boy was it complicated to make. Anyhoo, feel free to take a look and let me know what you think.

I've done something else I've not done before (and I feel a bit guilty about this one). I've put the Bluetooth code for Windows Phone 8.1 and Windows 8.1 up on Codeplex. I'm ashamed to admit that this is the first code that I've ever posted there. I really should have been posting stuff up there earlier. I'm determined to post more stuff as I come up with it.  

You can find a sample project (my Bluetooth Printer) and the BluetoothManager class that I used to communicate with the embedded Bluetooth controller. There are also details of how to configure the Bluetooth device and send and receive data. 

Importing Autographer Videos into Adobe Premiere Pro

The title says it all really. If you don't want to know how to import time lapse videos you made with your Autographer into Adobe Premiere Pro then just admire the picture above and move on with your life. 

If you do want to know this, then your'e in luck. Turns out that the Adobe importer is a bit fussy about file formats and it decides a lot of things from the file extension. The Autographer writes files with an extension of mp4, which are rejected. If you just rename your file, from blah.mp4 to blah.mpg then the files are accepted. I used the command prompt to do this. 

Hull Pie, Parade and Classic Cars

Did something today that we've been meaning to do for ages. Had lunch in Hull Pie. The word on the street (love using that phrase, although I'm probably not of an age to be streetwise any more) was that the food was ace.

And it was. Good prices, amazing cuisine. I had chicken, ham and leek pie on mash and it was great. Number one wife had the quiche and salad. Both were thoroughly excellent. Yesterday was the Lord Mayor's Parade and Hull was packed. We missed the World War 2 Hurricane flypast (we were eating pie at the time) but we did see some of the celebrations.

Little Drummer Boy

Look at all those buttons and dials. Must be at least three of them...

Me and the Town Crier go way back. No, really.

They had a big parade, which was very big, and a collection of classic cars, one of which actually was a Ford Consul Classic.

This was the car that my dad really wanted to buy in the early 1960s. We had to make do with a Ford Cortina. If they'd had one of them at the show I'd have been in car heaven. 

The car we never had

How to be a Husband

I've been practicing being a husband for over thirty years. I think I'm reasonable at it, although apparently I'm not the one to judge this.

I must admit I regard Tim Dowling as something of a newcomer to the field, with only twenty or so years under his belt. However, he has written a very funny book about the art of husbandry (if that's what you call it). 

There are some genuine insights, a lot of laugh out loud moments and a few poignant parts as well. If you have enjoyed reading his column in the weekend Guardian over the years then you will know what you are getting and like it all the more. 

If you've not read his work before I'd say you were in for a treat. He is that most rare of species, a self deprecating American, and very, very good at it. Although of course I'm sure he would beg to differ.

You can find his book here. 

Amazon at C4DI

Tonight at the C4DI June Developer Meetup we welcomed Ian Massingham from Amazon Web Services, who gave a great talk about cloud based deployment of computing resource. Put that way it doesn't sound that interesting, but whey you go on to think that it allows computing infrastructure to change performance and scope with just a flick of a virtual switch you start to see just how compelling this model is.

Consider a situation where you have an idea for a product or service which, if it works, would be useful to millions of people. More than that, you might have an idea which only works properly if you have millions of users. How do you get started? Well, the answer is to put your system in the cloud. You don't have to buy anything at the start and you just pay for the computing power that you use. If things go well you use your revenue to pay for more processing. If things go badly you walk away and have another idea.

Ian talked about the way that the Amazon service is provisioned around the globe so that your data doesn't need to to leave your part of the world, and how clever management of the addressing of addresses means that your users will always be connected to the fastest servers in their neck of the woods. 

It's very clever stuff, and it lets you do things and play with things in a way that was just not possible in the past. Want to test out a new service for a while, need a high performance cluster for twenty minutes,  reduce the power of your end user platforms and do all your rendering off site? Cloud services can do this kind of thing and their power is going up and their prices going down all the time. 

When I met Ian I made some fairly silly comments about Python, a computer language that I've been playing with during the "Wrestling with Python" sessions we are doing for teachers. I made the point that for some applications, where security is right at the front of the things you are worrying about, I don't think that Python is the best choice (I'm going to have to write a complete blog post to get my feelings on this one properly set out).

However, for cloud type stuff Python is pretty much perfect. It provides the fastest way to get from idea to running code that I've found. A skilled Python coder can wrangle hugely complex systems together really quickly. I still prefer C# personally, but when you hear what developers can put together in Python in record time you can't help but be impressed.

Python is a perfect language for the "Move fast and break things" culture where companies survive by innovating faster than the other guy. If your new services are a bit fragile that's a price worth paying, and you can always iterate until you get solid systems.

All in all, a very thought provoking presentation, which ended with some hugely tempting AWS offers from Ian to members of C4DI and anyone thinking about their startup programme starting soon. 

Quadcopters over Hull

Adam passed me this still shot from the quadcopter. Not bad.

I've enjoyed playing with number one son's home made tricopter, but this week the "proper" flying camera arrived in the department.  It's a Phantom Quadcopter. We took it for a flight today, launching it carefully from the middle of a deserted playing field near the university. 

It is awesome. The camera stabilization is astonishing. The pictures are incredibly smooth and very high quality. The device uses global positioning to allow it to hover at one point above the ground. There was a fair bit of wind around, but the device was completely stable. Apparently it's very easy to control, although I lacked the nerve to have a go myself. And anyway, I was taking pictures. 

The battery is good for quite a long flight and there are also coloured lights. We took long a tiny toy quadcopter as well, as you do.

This was great fun to play around with, and you can even get one with a camera built in too.

Formation flying

The ground crew