Microcontrollers

Lafbot Breakout

3d view of the PCB
KiCad offers 3d views. I think it looks pretty neat, myself.

I'm pretty new to laying out circuit boards. My first use with any sort of schematic editor was two years ago - the college curriculum introduces some schematic capture software. I separately started learning KiCad when I made my little bicycle light. As you can see, it's pretty basic. My first real experience laying out a PCB came a few months ago, with my work on my solar charger (it's on hold until school starts up again).

I've been working at Lafayette over the summer. I'm focusing on the lab sections for Digital I and II, a two-semester series that introduce students to the digital abstraction, logic, programmable chips, and a bit more. I created labs for Digital I ranging from realizing simple logic using discrete gates to creating a game of Pong with an FPGA and a modern VGA screen. Right now, though, I want to talk about Digital II.

Lafayette just refactored its curriculum to introduce engineers to more in the liberal arts (the prior curriculum requred only 4 non-STEM courses in a students tenure). To add the social sciences, a few engineering classes were cut from the curriculum: Solid State Physics and Computer Organization are gone. The new Digital curriculum attempts to compensate for the loss of Computer Organization by accelerating both and adding course material on general-purpose computers.

Lighting the Way

Schematic for the light
Isn't it beautiful?

Something's been bothering me for a while: I don't have a proper tail light on my bicycle. I used to, but it fell off. That was sad, but didn't faze me too much; I don't ride much at night, so I didn't really need the light.

Yesterday, I went on a ride around Easton in the dark. Yesterday, I figured out how to push code to AVR's. One and one makes two, and I decided to fabricate myself a taillight based around the ATTiny85.

AVR Adventures

A while ago, I decided that microcontrollers were interesting. I understate. They're cool. Very, very cool. For a few dollars, you can have yourself a tiny computer, capable of driving surprisingly advanced projects. Windowsill menorah? Check. Wandering pumpkin? Check. LED display? Check.

I decided that I should learn about them, especially after working with the Motorola 68HC12 in Digital Systems II. So, a while back, I bought myself a USBTiny programmer and a pile of AVR's. Weeks back, I soldered the board together and wired myself a target board. I got as far as talking to the chip before classes overwhelmed me again:

[ben@earthbound test$] sudo avrdude -c usbtiny -p t85

avrdude: AVR device initialized and ready to accept instructions

Reading | ################################################## | 100% 0.01s

avrdude: Device signature = 0x1e930b

avrdude: safemode: Fuses OK

avrdude done.  Thank you