Agent Orange heading for home…
We are making progress with our robot rugby players. This evening Brian managed to get his arena manager to detect a robot and its home square and then send the robot back home. Next step is to make that happen for all the robots in a match, which should be fun to watch….
It looks cute, but it is very plastic
Today I did something that I don’t do very often. I got rid of a camera. I’d read a few breathless reviews of the Fujifilm X-Half and these had convinced me that a less serious photographic device would make for a great picture taking experience. Well, yes and no. But mainly no.
When it arrived I was a bit taken aback at how plastic the experience was. I’ve used cameras with plastic bodies but most of these have metal controls. Not so with this one. Everything you touch is plastic. There’s nothing particularly wrong with this, but for the price I’d expected something a bit better.
The thinking behind the camera is that less is more. By removing distractions and providing the controls of a film camera the idea is that you focus on the pictures, rather than the mechanics of photography. It works up to a point. Outside in good light the camera takes nice enough pictures and the range of film simulations and special picture effects is quite fun. However, inside in poor light the image quality falls apart quicker than a cheap suit, and the flash is a puny LED which doesn’t really do much. I quite liked the simplicity, but I was irked by the thought that if I’d had a different camera with a few more controls with me I could have done things to make the pictures better.
There’s a special “film roll” mode where you can’t look at the pictures you’ve taken until you’ve finished a “roll”. This is quite fun and even includes the experience of having to wind-on after each shot. However, it also restricts you to the rather poor optical viewfinder and the winding-on business gets tiresome quickly.
To view your “camera roll” pictures you’ve taken you have to “develop” them on your phone. You get to watch each image appear as it is copied from camera to phone, and the camera makes a nifty “contact print” of all shots on the roll, but it isn’t really worth the hassle. Other observations:
Battery life is great (it uses a proper sized battery) and the camera takes full-sized SD cards which is nice - although there isn’t a memory card in the box. You charge the battery in the camera via the camera’s usb port. No charger is supplied.
You can manually set the aperture and have the camera set the shutter speed. You can also manually focus the lens, but good luck with that on the tiny oled screen (which is hard to see in bright sunlight).
The camera has a rubber lens cap which is a pain to take on and off. The lens underneath is nice and sharp in good light though.
There is a little inset “film window” on the back next to the display which pretends to show the back of the film cassette in use. This seems quite nifty until you realise that the rear screens are crops of a larger panel that they could have made completely visible for a much larger view.
There are hardly any buttons on the back. Everything is controlled by touching and swiping which doesn’t work very well (at least for me).
The camera only produces compressed JPEG images (and quite ropey ones too when you look close). You have no chance of fiddling with RAW sensor images.
You can’t combine film simulations and special camera modes, unlike on the far superior Instax wide Evo (which also takes instant pictures)
If you need to be on the cutting edge of Fuji-fashion the camera is nice enough, and if it was half the price it would be a lot more compelling. Me, I’m swapping my tiny ex X-Half for a great big Hasselblad lens which I think I’ll have much more fun with.
If you want a fun little camera to carry about which takes amazing pictures, provides support for RAW images, is made of metal, has a proper viewfinder and costs a lot less you should get yourself a second hand Lumix LX100 It doesn’t have a built-in flash, which is sad, but it does come with a tiny electronic flash you can fit on the top which works really well.
Back in the day I had a way with the typewriter…
After my recent purchase of an old Hi-Fi system I’ve dug out a bunch of nearly fifty year old cassettes I recorded back in the 1970’s. Now, you might have heard that old tape falls apart, loses its signal and all the oxide comes off. Not in my experience. All the tapes I’ve tried so far work fine. My particular favourites are the things that I recorded from the weekly chart show. They have survived perfectly, complete with FM static and extra interference when a car drove past the flat or the chap upstairs turned on his hairdryer.
If you happen to have a bunch of old cassettes lying around I’d strongly advise you to dig them out and have a listen.
I was doing some work on a robot and needed somewhere to put the bolts I’d taken out. Turns out the wheel does a perfect job….
If you’ve ever wanted to keep your lights flickering while your PICO-W connects to Wi-Fi this post is for you. For anyone else, just enjoy the picture.
The problem I had was that the WiFi.begin method in the Raspberry Pi PICO-W Arduino framework is blocking. In other words, when I call the method to connect to Wi-Fi execution returns after the connection has been made, blocking any other calls. And my lights stop flickering. Which is I don’t like.
I spent lot of time with ChatGPT trying to write an asynchronous version of the begin method for PICO. I learned a lot and I was on the point of getting something working (probably) when I noticed a little method called beginNoBlock hidden in the PICO Wi-Fi library. Turns out that this does exactly what I want. All I had to do was call this method instead of begin and it all just worked. I’ve added this to the latest release of the framework at https://github.com/connected-little-boxes/HullOS-Z
That didn’t go too well
If you have a steering wheel (or even if you don’t) I can strongly recommend the BeamNG driving simulation. It really is great fun. As a game it doesn’t have the depth of full price ones like Forza, but it does have impressive physics and gives you a highly realistic gear change action, even down to the damage you do to the gearbox if you get it wrong. The game is not based on any particular car designs (although a lot of them look very familiar) which means that the cars can be crashed and bashed out of shape as much as you like.
There is on-road and off-road action and a whole bunch of scenarios, including one where you have to escape lots of tiny Italian police cars in an experience that brings back fond memories of the wonderful “Driver” game for PlayStation One.
And it is refreshingly cheap at less than 20 pounds on Steam. Great stuff.
The August 2025 edition of Raspberry Pi magazine is now in the shops and available for download. I’ve written a couple of articles for this one. Inside you can find my deathless prose about using a Raspberry Pi as a desktop replacement (which works rather well) and storing settings in embedded Python apps.
Not sure how this makes my steering wheel work better….
I like my Logitech G29 steering wheel and it works well. However, since I installed the G Hub application that lets me configure it I’ve had Discord asking if Logitech can have access to my account. The access is fairly limited, but even so, I don’t see why I should have to do this. I went to a Tech Session a while back that made the point that data is the most valuable commodity on the planet at the moment. So I guess this is just part of the price of things now.
The gear lever is worth the extra cash
The Logitech G29 steering wheel is a good option if you fancy a bit of force feedback with your digital driving. It frequently pops up heavily discounted. The PlayStation version works with Gran Turismo but also with the Forza games on your PC. The only problem I’ve had with it is that the buttons are a bit hard to understand. The game asks you to press buttons and you have no idea which one does what. I’ve spent a while fiddling with it and made this little map.
| Button # | Label | In-Game Mapping | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0 | X | Forza 1 | Confirm |
| 1 | Square | Forza 2 | View |
| 2 | Circle | Forza 3 | Back |
| 3 | Triangle | Forza 4 | Rewind |
| 4 | Right Paddle | Forza 5 | Shift up |
| 5 | Left Paddle | Forza 6 | Shift down |
| 6 | R2 Pedal | Forza 7 | Accelerator |
| 7 | L2 Pedal | Forza 8 | Brake |
| 8 | Sunrise Button | Forza 9 | ESC in G HUB |
| 9 | Hamburger Button | Forza 10 | ENTER in G HUB |
| 10 | R3 | Forza 11 | |
| 11 | L3 | Forza 12 | |
| 12 | 1st Gear Button | Forza 13 | |
| 13 | 2nd Gear Button | Forza 14 | |
| 14 | 3rd Gear Button | Forza 15 | |
| 15 | 4th Gear Button | Forza 16 | |
| 16 | 5th Gear Button | Forza 17 | |
| 17 | 6th Gear Button | Forza 18 | |
| 18 | Reverse Gear Button | Forza 19 | |
| 19 | Plus (+) Button | Forza 20 | |
| 20 | Minus (–) Button | Forza 21 | |
| 21 | Red Dial Right | Forza 22 | |
| 22 | Red Dial Left | Forza 23 | |
| 23 | Red Dial Press | Forza 24 | |
| 24 | PS Logo Button | Forza 25 | MAP |
| Direction | Forza Device Mapping | Function |
|---|---|---|
| Left | Device 1 SW 1 | LEFT |
| Right | Device 1 SW 2 | RIGHT |
| Up | Device 1 SW 3 | UP |
| Down | Device 1 SW 4 | DOWN |
The left-most column is the button number as far as the steering wheel device is concerned. The label tells you which button it is on the wheel. The “In game mapping” column gives the button numbers in Forza and finally the right hand column gives you notes for useful in-game functions.
I’ve used the G Hub application to map two steering wheel buttons to ESC and ENTER, so that I can use the wheel without needing a keyboard.
Ready for firing
Apparently outings where you do stuff are now the thing. With this in mind, I recommend Pots on Pier Street off Humber Street in Hull. We did some pottery painting a while back in Leeds, which was great fun, and now we can do it much closer to home. We went along this afternoon.
The setup is great, the support impressive and I got the chance to make a black bun version of my previous work.
On the box it says Flip 7 is “The greatest card game of all time!”. I think that they are pushing their luck with that statement, but since that is what the game is all about, it is probably fair enough.
You use a special deck of cards. Most of the cards are numbered from 0 to 12. There are 12 cards numbered 12, 11 cards numbered 11 and so on. There is one zero card, which kind of breaks the pattern, but there you go.
There are also special cards, some of which give you free points, others let you inflict things on other players or give you protection against “busting”.
You “bust” when you pick up a card with a number which matches a card you already have. So getting a 12 card is good news score-wise, but bad news in that there is are plenty of other 12 cards out there that can ruin your round if you get another one.
During a round the dealer will ask you whether you want to get another card or stick with your score. A round ends when everyone is either bust or happy with their lot. Then all the cards go onto the discard pile and another round starts.
Each round score is added to your total until someone tops 200, when they win. Oh, and if you manage to get seven number cards in your hand you get a special bonus.
The luck pushing element is finely judged, and some of the special cards can be quite fun, particularly the one you can use to force another player to draw three cards. Good fun, and works with a large number of players - which is great.
Took the big camera into the garden today. Totally worth it.
Some software you release. Other stuff just seems to escape… HullOS-Z has now escaped onto GitHub. It’s the next version of the Connected Little Boxes software and the Hull Pixelbot controller, rolled into one enticing bunch and dropped onto the Raspberry Pi PICO W. Other versions will be coming along soon.
It’s definitely a work in progress and the initial focus is getting something to work with Robot Rugby. It is also the first step in integrating PythonIsh (and another surprise language) with Connected Little Boxes.
You are welcome to have a play with it and let me know what you think. In fact I’d love that. The repository has a uf2 file you can drop onto a Pico W or you can build the whole thing yourself using Platform IO.
Time taken to resolve problem - 1 minute
Take taken to fill in questionnaire sent to find out how well my problem was resolved - 5 minutes
All contributions gratefully recieved
Had a great birthday today. Got a new money box I can use to save up for cameras (and film), along with chocolate goodies, a camera bag and a book about experimental photography. Then it was time for the hardware meetup. I took cake. It seemed the right thing to do.
In the spirit of novel musical instruments, Ian brought along this amazing wind powered keyboard.
We had a good group of folks turned up. All the cake was eaten and the conversation was as wide-ranging as ever. Ross had brought along his “awesome keyboard controller” and it was, er, awesome (so good I forgot to take pictures). We also had the next iteration of rugby playing robots.
These are the robots in the arena
Ben was coding the robot movement and Brian had some software running for tracking them.
You can see the blue markers on the tops of the robots showing they are being tracked.
The next step is to send position information to the robots so that the code in them can work out which way to go. We should be doing that at the next meetup in a couple of weeks.
You are not allowed to call it “Brian”
I took this picture on Sunday at the Science Museum. What is the name of the computer?
Scene: A single performer on the stage, sitting at a large bench with a magnifying class and assorted small tools. The performer speaks:
“And now we move on to the Casio CA-500WE-1AEF which combines an 8 digit calculator with timekeeping functions. It uses a single CR2016 lithium coin cell which we can access by removing four 1mm screws found in the back of the case…”
The camera pulls back to reveal an audience of spectators staring earnestly at the performer. The camera continues to move backwards away from the stage, backwards through a corridor, into the foyer and then out through the front doors of the theatre onto the street where it lights on a sign that says…..
“Watch batteries replaced”
..as described in the blog
Last year we followed our trip to Hyper Japan with the Formula E finals. This year the timings are different, so we settled for a trip to one of my favourite places in the world, the Science Museum. They’ve added a few bits since we last visited. There’s a great section about you as a person and a machine, and another about energy. They’ve still got the displays of stuff from the past, which is being updated and now contains a disconcerting amount of stuff that I remember….
When does a “new” sticker stop being a thing?
Right hand drive…
Thanks to my recent outing I was able to describe in excruciating detail what all the various bits do.
The start of somethiung big…
My favourite machine of the day. A single cable goes up and down around 10 pulleys which are slightly off centre and rotate at different speeds to simulate the effect of various celestial bodies (sun, moon, planets etc) on the earth. The cable ends up being connected to a pen that draws a line on paper drawn through the machine from one spool to the other. In other words, you turn the handle on the right and the machine displays future tide levels.
Then we got on our train back to Hull and were treated to exactly the same experience going home as we had getting to London. This time they added more excitement with live arrival data for both our train and our connecting one. They also added more jeopardy, with hardly any trains going to Hull later that evening. Would be we stuck in Doncaster? Fortunately, again, both trains were late, but in a good way for us. Why didn’t we just catch a train that that straight from Hull to London you ask? Well, last time I did that the train wasn’t late. It just wasn’t there. I think I’m reaching the point where train travel is just too exciting for me. Anyhoo, it has been a great couple of days.
We’ve been to Hyper Japan before. Last year. It’s still awesome. I took a camera and grabbed a bunch of pictures that look very similar to my previous ones.
They had all the things that were there last time, including lots of little stalls manned by artists turning out all kinds of art. Great fun.
I’m looking forward to next year.
We knew exactly what was going to happen when someone shouted “Raise the alarm!”. But it was still funny. That’s a huge tribute to writing, performing and set design. It takes a lot of work to be that silly, that quickly. Not all the lines were that good/bad. But there were so many of them, they came so fast and they were performed with such conviction that the packed audience, including us, were swept along. We got running gags, set pieces, impressive staging and good ice-cream. And they even found time for an engaging story with some poignant endings.
We were at “The Comedy about Spies”, part of our mini-mini-break to London. The very first element of the break was an exciting edge of the seat experience provided by the British Rail transport network which, by the simple expedient of making one train late, added a lot of excitement to what should have been a routine journey. “Would we arrive in time to see our next train leaving the station?”. Who knew? Certainly not anyone in charge of the network. As it turned out the train we were meeting was also late and, in a magical plot twist, not even the train we were expecting so our seat reservations didn’t work. Ho hum.
Anyhoo, we got to London, had a walk around and then headed to the play. It was really good. I take my stupidity very seriously and this stuff was done very well indeed. Strongly recommended.
Pro tip: The seats that we had (Row U in the stalls) where somewhat cheaper because of their “limited view”. This didn’t reduce our enjoyment (they had a video screen showing the bits we couldn’t see). If you want to reduce the price of your great night out you should go for them.
Rob Miles is technology author and educator who spent many years as a lecturer in Computer Science at the University of Hull. He is also a Microsoft Developer Technologies MVP. He is into technology, teaching and photography. He is the author of the World Famous C# Yellow Book and almost as handsome as he thinks he is.
