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Who Stepped Up When the Chips Were Down?

Who Stepped Up When the Chips Were Down?

By David Groom

David Groom

David bought his first Arduino in 2007 as part of a Roomba hacking project. Since then, he has been obsessed with writing code that you can touch. David fell in love with the original Pebble smartwatch, and even more so with its successor, which allowed him to combine the beloved wearable with his passion for hardware hacking via its smartstrap functionality. Unable to part with his smartwatch sweetheart, David wrote a love letter to the Pebble community, which blossomed into Rebble, the service that keeps Pebbles ticking today, despite the company's demise in 2016. When he's not hacking on wearables, David can probably be found building a companion bot, experimenting with machine learning, growing his ever-increasing collection of dev boards, or hacking on DOS-based palmtops from the 90s.

Find David on Mastodon at @ishotjr@chaos.social and to a far lesser extent on Twitter at @IShJR.

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It’s been another tumultuous year in the world of embedded electronics. Supply chain snags have scarcely relented, while new chips jostle for position as the maker’s go-to. Meanwhile, lots of exciting new boards, software, and other technologies let us continue to innovate. Let’s survey the maker landscape and see who stepped up when the chips were […]

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Smart Swaps For Hard To Find Boards

Smart Swaps For Hard To Find Boards

By David Groom

David Groom

David bought his first Arduino in 2007 as part of a Roomba hacking project. Since then, he has been obsessed with writing code that you can touch. David fell in love with the original Pebble smartwatch, and even more so with its successor, which allowed him to combine the beloved wearable with his passion for hardware hacking via its smartstrap functionality. Unable to part with his smartwatch sweetheart, David wrote a love letter to the Pebble community, which blossomed into Rebble, the service that keeps Pebbles ticking today, despite the company's demise in 2016. When he's not hacking on wearables, David can probably be found building a companion bot, experimenting with machine learning, growing his ever-increasing collection of dev boards, or hacking on DOS-based palmtops from the 90s.

Find David on Mastodon at @ishotjr@chaos.social and to a far lesser extent on Twitter at @IShJR.

View more articles by David Groom

We can’t hardly wait for the chip shortage to be over and dev boards to be abundant again, but instead of waiting for somebody to fix the supply chain, we’ve gathered a list of near substitutes and potential replacements for your next project. Unsatisfied with back-orders for your favorite Raspberry Pi or Arduino? Use the […]

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A Perfect Circle: An LED “Supergroup” Collaborates on the Lux Lavalier

A Perfect Circle: An LED “Supergroup” Collaborates on the Lux Lavalier

By David Groom

David Groom

David bought his first Arduino in 2007 as part of a Roomba hacking project. Since then, he has been obsessed with writing code that you can touch. David fell in love with the original Pebble smartwatch, and even more so with its successor, which allowed him to combine the beloved wearable with his passion for hardware hacking via its smartstrap functionality. Unable to part with his smartwatch sweetheart, David wrote a love letter to the Pebble community, which blossomed into Rebble, the service that keeps Pebbles ticking today, despite the company's demise in 2016. When he's not hacking on wearables, David can probably be found building a companion bot, experimenting with machine learning, growing his ever-increasing collection of dev boards, or hacking on DOS-based palmtops from the 90s.

Find David on Mastodon at @ishotjr@chaos.social and to a far lesser extent on Twitter at @IShJR.

View more articles by David Groom

Mad Season, Cream, Prophets of Rage, the Traveling Wilburys — what do they have in common? Perhaps it’s that you’ve never heard of them, but they are also all supergroups — successful artists teaming up to create something new and exciting. In the world of LEDs, instead of Layne Staley, Tom Morello, and Tom Petty, […]

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When Chips Are Scarce: Maker Ingenuity in Uncertain Times

When Chips Are Scarce: Maker Ingenuity in Uncertain Times

By David Groom

David Groom

David bought his first Arduino in 2007 as part of a Roomba hacking project. Since then, he has been obsessed with writing code that you can touch. David fell in love with the original Pebble smartwatch, and even more so with its successor, which allowed him to combine the beloved wearable with his passion for hardware hacking via its smartstrap functionality. Unable to part with his smartwatch sweetheart, David wrote a love letter to the Pebble community, which blossomed into Rebble, the service that keeps Pebbles ticking today, despite the company's demise in 2016. When he's not hacking on wearables, David can probably be found building a companion bot, experimenting with machine learning, growing his ever-increasing collection of dev boards, or hacking on DOS-based palmtops from the 90s.

Find David on Mastodon at @ishotjr@chaos.social and to a far lesser extent on Twitter at @IShJR.

View more articles by David Groom

The past few years have been … unprecedented. Supply chain failures manifest themselves visibly around us, from parking lots in Detroit full of cars that can’t be finished for lack of a single part, to immense backlogs of container ships at the Port of Long Beach. From consumers all the way up to foundries, it feels […]

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A RISC-V REVOLUTION: The Rise of Free and Open-Source Silicon for Makers

A RISC-V REVOLUTION: The Rise of Free and Open-Source Silicon for Makers

Gareth Halfacree

By Gareth Halfacree

Gareth Halfacree

Gareth Halfacree is the author of the Raspberry Pi User Guide and an expert in educational and embedded computing. A noted technology journalist and long-time tech author, Gareth also has an extensive background in computing education.

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Makers are well-used to the benefits of free and open-source hardware, from being able to study and iterate on designs by others, to the promise that if a design goes out of production you can always make replacements yourself. Open-source silicon, though, is not so well understood — but thanks to the success of the […]

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Community Maker Award: Noelle Conover of Matt’s Maker Space

Community Maker Award: Noelle Conover of Matt’s Maker Space

Noelle Conover

By Noelle Conover

Noelle Conover

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Have you ever watched children in a makerspace? They come alive! Especially the children who never had a chance to use their hands or their minds in creative ways. My own children, now in their 20s and 30s, love visiting makerspaces. They never had a woodshop class or sewing in school. In the 1990s, schools […]

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The Winner’s Circle: Here are the Winners and Standouts From our Inaugural Amazing Maker Awards

The Winner’s Circle: Here are the Winners and Standouts From our Inaugural Amazing Maker Awards

Make: Editors

By Make: Editors

Make: Editors

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Every maker who shares a project is amazing, and the same can be said collectively of our maker community, which supports and values the work of makers. We hope these awards help gain recognition in the broader society for the creative and technical contributions of makers. The Amazing Maker Awards celebrate what makers do — […]

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