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Quorten Blog 1

First blog for all Quorten's blog-like writings

Trying to get at that electronic interface? Well, there’s no point in trying any harder to search the Internet for documentation on that interface. No, that is private knowledge only found in the heads of camera repairpeople who have been working on that technology at the time. So, that problem aside, let’s look toward reverse engineering the interface.

20180318/Google reverse engineer electronic communication interface logic level 5 v

Oh, this is really helpful, but it only scratches the surface, with an emphasis on modern devices.

20180318/http://resources.infosecinstitute.com/reverse-engineering-of-embedded-devices/

Not so helpful.

20180318/=https://www.element14.com/community/thread/37817/l/reverse-engineering-old-serial-devices-and-cloning-with-arduino?displayFullThread=true

Read on →

Oh, interesting. HP’s Multi-Jet Fusion (MJF) is another method similar to high-speed sintering. However, it differs by the use of an additional detailing agent, rather than only using a heating agent.

Also, you’re wondering whether there are companies that are selling High-Speed Sintering 3D printers in commercial production? Indeed, there is at least one: voxeljet, and there are rumors of others to come such as Ricoh.

20180318/Google high-speed sintering
20180318/https://www.engineering.com/3DPrinting/3DPrintingArticles/ArticleID/14710/The-Coming-Proliferation-of-High-Speed-Sintering.aspx
20180318/https://www.voxeljet.com/unternehmen/news/voxeljet-introduces-high-speed-sintering-process/
20180318/https://www.voxeljet.com/3d-drucksysteme/vx200/

Powering the Raspberry Pi?

20180315/DuckDuckGo raspberry pi power supply voltage board

Oh, interesting. You can also power the Raspberry Pi via the 3.3 volt outputs, with some more caveats compared to using the 5 volt input.

20180315/https://raspberrypi.stackexchange.com/questions/1617/how-do-i-supply-power-through-the-gpio

  • UPDATE 2019-12-04: That is not recommended, however. Rather, you should put the 3.3 V power on the 5 V outputs and that will also work, while providing 3.3 V power on the 5 V power supply rails.

Okay, so there are other recommendations here too. Use a 12 volt (12 V) input for other electronics in your system that you step down to 5 volts (5 V) and feed through the USB input to power the Raspberry Pi.

20180315/https://www.modmypi.com/blog/how-do-i-power-my-raspberry-pi

Okay, yes, so we have plenty of ideas here. Now how to solder this thing. Yes, it actually is possible with your blunt tip soldering iron, purportedly you just need practice. Put the tip on the connection and the wire to heat them up, and the solder on the connection but don’t let it touch the tip. The heat will draw the solder in and fill up the area, so I am told. Be careful not to leave the soldering iron on there for more than 5 seconds, otherwise you could damage your components. Also, make sure you are careful with ventilation and not breathing in the fumes, and wash your hands after soldering. To remove solder, there are wicks you can use: put the wick on the area you want to remove solder, and heat the wick by putting the iron on top of it. The wick will fill up, so you can gently pull it across the board to sweep up more solder.

Use tape to help hold in place components with very short leads.

Fat soldering iron tip? Don’t worry. Use a magnifying glass, or, er, 10x stereo microscope, and with practice even the tiniest of joints can be soldered with such a fat iron.

Read on →

  • Nothing will fully replace analog. Paper, 2D images, you can’t beat it.

    • Again, I reiterate, because this is important! I searched for this and found it, that means it’s important!

The risks of digital data storage, format obsolescence, and conversely the non-issue of optical storage. Specifically, microfilm archival. Simplicity and ease of use. Likewise, “well-established” computer compatibility patterns, or lack thereof.

Computers have been around for quite some time for now, and one unfortunate trend that has become quite proven out in general is the difficulty of data migrations. This was more a problem early on in computers than it is today. Historically, most digital data was stored in proprietary file formats, and any effort to migrate data digitally from an old system to a new system almost always entailed a complex process of reverse engineering the proprietary file format, writing a computer program to do a file format conversion, running the converter, and copying the converted data to the new computer system, which might involve the use of special adapters and communications protocols, of which interfacing both sides between the old and the new systems is difficult. Yes, computer systems have a long history of creating obsolescence.

Read on →

Each video stream can be divided up into segments where the scanning software processes it in a specific mode. Ideally, these segments can be auto-detected based off of contents inside the video streams.

Matter of fact, for our purposes, our typical video streams should only have like three stages:

  1. Compute location/orientation of camera.
  2. Compute location/orientation of laser.
  3. Main scanner loop, record video sweep of laser acros scan field.

Important! This company provides a great archival service that helps you expose microfilm, along with many other scanning and publishing services. Yeah, it really makes you wow. They can convert paper CAD printouts into digital files. Yeah, so think like 50 years from now, they’ll still be in business and able to convert traditional paper to the latest digital electronic trends. Yep, microfilm is the way to go if you want to preserve things for sure.

20180306/DuckDuckGo microform ISBN
20180306/DuckDuckGo buy microfilm book
20180306/http://microfilmscanning.net/

  • Yes! This is what you were looking for. Microfilm printing services. Some service that converts digital to microfilm? This is it. This is what you were looking for.

    • Success! So the previously failed search is now a passed search.

Oh, interesting word here. Reprography, for the art of reproducing captured/fixed images.

20180306/https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reprography

Delta backups design

2018-03-06

Categories: inven-sys   asman  
Tags: inven-sys   asman  

  • Delta backups? Only necessary at a file level, as that faithfully replicates the nature of a photographic archival system. If you replace one photograph with another, chances are the other photograph will be entirely different, so delta diffs will not be beneficial.

    • Again, I reiterate, because this is important! I searched for this and found it, that means it’s important!

“Synthetic aperture” you ask? Yeah, that’s what people are trying to do with modern smartphone cameras to reduce the size, but they are using different terms like “light field.” Synthetic aperture is not a new idea, and the terminology has been used with radar for many years.

20180304/https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthetic-aperture_radar
20180304/https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aperture_synthesis
20180304/https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthetic_aperture_sonar
20180304/https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthetic_Aperture_Ultrasound
20180304/https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthetically_thinned_aperture_radar
20180304/https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beamforming


The best is by far the swept line methods in terms of noise. You can do swept line with either a laser module or a video projector. The video projector method is faster, but the laser method is cheaper.

There is also another video projector method where you shine a series of varying bar width patterns, one after another, which gives each “pixel” a binary code. Two cameras measure the same object, and that creates images where you can cast rays with common binary codes. The nearest points on those rays will give you a 3D point. This method is very sensitive to noise because one uncertain time value can completely throw off your binary code. Suffice it to say, it is not recommended from a quality standpoint, not to mention that the cost of such a method is higher too.

Read on →

So, to clarify some questions I had.

  • NiCd and NiMh batteries can be charged in series. However, make sure you properly limit and regulate the voltage if you do this.

Lots of interesting search engine adventures in thrashing around trying to rediscover one of my already logged links uncovered some new and interesting articles from Instructables. Yes, it turned out that the article I was looking for was not from Instructables, it was from an entirely different website.

20180304/DuckDuckGo instructables battery backup alarm clock
20180304/DuckDuckGo instructables nimh battery charging alarm clock
20180304/DuckDuckGo instructables dc battery charging alarm clock
20180304/DuckDuckGo instructables dc battery charging alarm clock

This article is really interesting. It covers how you can make your own switched mode power supply of a sort from fundamental circuit components. Hey, wait, is it saying that you don’t need motor control ICs if you use MOSFETs as your interface units? Maybe. But yes, if you’re trying to save space, you should definitely go for the ICs.

20180304/http://www.instructables.com/id/Build-Your-Own-Battery-Power-Supply/
20180304/DuckDuckGo dc battery charging alarm clock site:instructables.com
20180311/DuckDuckGo line power battery charging backup site:instructables.com

Read on →