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I learned from a good friend to finish a trip or a stage in life by making a recopilation of the musique you have heard. I want to share what I have being listening too, and what later one will bring me back to this moment in life.
Tatatattan… I have being renovated my scolarship from the Mexican Institute of Arts (FONCA). Muchas Gracias a Micaela que me ayudo con el reporte toda la noche.
I feel everything is tuned up (for the I feel community)
“Im gonna give you what you need to survive in a rock&roll conversation” Said a friend as he was surprised of my ignorance in the field. These are some songs he showed me.
Globalication
I once got really upset in my first trip in Europe when I discover that I even though Herbal Essences was an International Company and had presence all through Europe it didn’t have the same products. What does this mean ? That I had to deal during 8 months with crazy spongy freeze hair. (The mousse herbal essences will be item number one in my list if I ever had to go to a dessert Island). The same happened when in I started to get homesick with olive oil, manchego cheese and jamon serrano, I wish just to have pancakes. Why pancakes ? My mom makes them every morning … and well how difficult could it be to find pancakes in a world where there is a McDonalds in every neighborhood. Wrong! I wasn’t lucky neither in Spain, Hungary, Germany, and France (I insist pancakes is Not the same than a crepe).
This is my second long trip in Europe, I knew what to except and now instead of missing or expecting I let myself surprise from the adaptation and perception that a culture has about other food (of course this trip I brought 4 cans of hair mousse). It’s a common question that I hear: what is American food? Or statements as There is no such thing as American food. But the more I travel I discover that there is and there is even an adaptation of American food in other countries, and most people even if they struggle to admit…love it. In the office I’m doing my internship they love Bagels, and they brought me to two places known as the best bagels delis. The conception of bagels in France is really different of what I experienced in the US. Ironically in France they give more importance to the content of a bagel than the bread itself. They mix many ingredients and each style of bagel is named after landmarks of NYC. There is even a bagel of foie gras! They are different, but amazingly good.
This food “issues¨ had play an important role in my life, maybe because of changing constantly you have to create ideal food, as a memory that doesn’t want to be erase.
A good friend once wrote me after hearing all my explorations of macdonals and mcflurrys :
This last trip in France I see that many things have change, I no longer hold to those ideals, or maybe I’m creating ideal moments for a future… I hope not.
When you listen to French is as if you where eating a Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream, yeah! taste delicious but you don’t have any idea of what the ingredients are. You can just name maybe: marshmallow, chocolate chips, and vanilla ice cream. When you learn a new word you cannot stop hearing it. A friend mentioned the other day that she really likes the phrase C’est marrant, and I had never heard it, but since explained what it meant and I recognized the pronunciation, I cannot stop hearing it. Marrant means funny, “its funny”. I also learned Truc two weeks ago, truc means stuff, but many stuff, they use it as a noun, for referring to things, and actions, and places, it can be use instead of choose. Another way to say truc is Machin, or Bidule, so you have many ways to name the uncertainty of things, places and life.
As my lessons continue, I feel that I am learning to parse this long String called French, what is most interesting is that there are words that I haven’t noticed that there are there.
Pendaison de crémaillère, as Nico just got his apartment I asked how would you called a house warming party in French, and Nico explained that it is called pendaison de crémaillère, La crèmaillère is an artifact used in old French houses fire stoves to control the fire. This artifact would be the last thing to put in your house and it would be needed to eat.
Arno is always hungry, and as the clock was hitting 12 he couldn’t wait longer and started talking about what we would have for lunch, so he started to wonder and to explore all the differents options that we could have for lunch, the only bad thing is that he is in diet, since he stop smoking he gain some weight. So there where many limitations in his wondering, until he arrived to the idea of a Greek Salad from the sandwich deli. Then is when he said: Y’a bon dans gros bidon. And so my lesson started: The literal translation would be “It would be good for my big bootle“. Bootle is a word also for belly or stomack, the best word to describe the expression is: It’s yummy.
The computer of Arno broke, Julien and Arno where trying to fix it as I heard a weird french pronuntiation as if they where acting a cheap soap opera. I asked them what where they talking and they metion Supreme NTM the initials stands for Nique ta mère, he is one of the most famous rappers in France.
As I thought them a slang word in english I told them about Tomboy and the concept and they told me that in french they would say Garçon manque. Manque is to miss, garçon is men.
Created with Admarket’s flickrSLiDR.
0 “ICE”
Highlights from the trip: I learned a new word. Jennifer taught me how to say “ICE” which I repeated over and over. I had picked up the word “NO” last week when my mom kept saying it to me- not sure why??? So now I tell her “no” all of …
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3 : valediction.
I learned a new word last night: valediction. I found it while looking up the meaning of “yours truly.” See, in Snow Crash one of the main character’s names is YT, short for yours truly. It’s cute, but I wanted to know if it made sense …
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8 “Anticipointment.”
I learned a new word yesterday. “Anticipointment.” That’s when you see a promo for a news story, like three times, and you sit through the whole excruciating hour of news, and the story finally comes on and its a big NOTHING. …
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13 “Haji.”
When I got to Iraq in 2003, I learned a new word-”Haji.” Haji was the enemy. Haji was every Iraqi. He was not a person, or a father, or a teacher, or a worker. But where does this word come from? Every Muslim strives to take a …
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14 “precocial”
I learned a new word today - “precocial”. It means “relatively mature and mobile from the moment of birth or hatching”. I learned it looking up killdeer. Because today there were chicks in the field with the adults - little miniatures …
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17 , utopious,
I learned a new word today: utopious. Okay, so, it’s not a real word. Even better. It’s genius: utopia literally means, “no place” (yes, the Greeks were a bit cynical and that’s why we like them); so a fake word, utopious, fits the idea …
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29 : prodrome.
today i learned a new word: prodrome. the doctor mentioned it when describing what was going on with the twinkle. i stashed it in the back of my head as a new word for my vocab (not that it will help me with any rock ‘n’ roll journalism …
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45 : “Lynchian
In class tonight I learned a new word: “Lynchian.” Referring to the style of Director David Lynch, Lynchian film style has a flexible sense of time and sound density. The sound in both LOST ( TV series) and Inland Empire (movie) …
I’m interested in the different way we use language to communicate. Im of the believe that when you learn a new language you learn a new way to say things and you expand your abstraction of the world. Many concepts that before you tought of unexistant materialize in a way and instead of trying to find different explanations you just use a concept one word.
But still I find myself discussing with some americans in how things would be much easy if we all learned English. I would like to create an presentation or exhibition of the richness of different language. I have two ideas:
1. Is an AtoZ animation/presentation with some type of simple interaction with a language and how I interact with them.
a asci
b braille
c c++
d
E emoticon 
f flag semaphore
g grade
h html
i
j
k
l love
m morse
N notes
ñ PIñaTa
o /o/ Close-mid back rounded vowe
p
q
r
s sign language
t translation
u unique
v non verbal communication
w
x
y
z
Another idea is some interaction of unique words that cannot be translated in words, for example:
Antojito - food specially made for Crave… it will be like crave food
Cantinflear - when someone is talking nonsense
Malinchista - The one that loves the foreign world.
왕따 /Wangtha:/ - a person who is forced to be isolated mentally by the other person, usually in class at school, among the students. (Seugran)
Saudade!! It can means - I miss u!! — saudade is a feeling!! (Petra)
Weltschmerz world-pain denotes the kind of feeling experienced by someone who understands that the physical reality can never satisfy the demands of the mind.
Running Spam what are the words that distinguish him and me when we writte emails? Email analyzing of a close friend with whom email has become one of our main forms of communication, I use the bayesian formula to find out which are the words we use in our emails. These are the results:
him me
I did another visualization of the words that distinguish him:
Pedro Paramo en Regular Expressions
A en seguí hacer dijo sus costó lugar a en pensé lugar en de vivió saber sus por volví saber en en seguí lugar de de volví caber por todo Sentí haber en de murió mujer de a seguí sonar todo Se sentí mujer de de Llegué venir a de Toqué venir Se de quedé haber de dar podré morir de pude sentí morir de cosa murió haber dar sino murió mujer pude de habló jugar cosa se de mí tomar sino aun si tú salir de de de tú salir se a debió hacer aun de sentí haber de sus jerró salir a a te dé salir de a pensó haber sus dio .
Allí rezar a en Cerró saber a hijo quedó decir dio caro murió haber en Pero Pensé dejar hijo a sentí mirar caro de Ve tú mujer Pero a lo sé haber a a de mí hacer de de Quizá lugar a se contó subir a de Pensé bajar de era Pensé rizar se de quizá pasar de Por Quizá pasar era eso yo sé volar de a murió saber Por Era sentí mujer eso ese Ve tú haber a de no sé ganar Era aire mandó decir ese de seguí pasar de por de mí saber aire de cerré matar de baja lo sé hacer por se palpó poner de se quizá hacer baja Para salió decir se para roció cesar se baja Yo sé rodar Para dice quizá decir para se juntó lugar baja se cerró mujer dice de Pensé mujer se es pensé pesar se por sentí pedir de se de mí hacer es tan sentí matar por Son llegué tener se a pensó mujer tan de causó poder Son de contó hacer a de pensó pedir de su dolió mujer de de Ya mí decir de por murió mujer su por Quizá haber de pero Falló latir por en Murió venir por su Murió poder pero con sentó poder en dio Salió decir su sus Sentí decir con para pensé sacar dio de quedé decir sus de llegué sacar para por senté pagar de ese Dormí vivir de se lo oí decir por su lo oí pagar ese era volví pedir se casi habló hacer su si No sé comer era a quitó haber casi a ya sé venir si si Pensó mujer a se quizá decir a a Sabrá poner si a sabrá hacer se dijo pensó pasar a de No sé vivir a por mandó pesar dijo en habrá hacer de de habrá hacer por a pensó decir en a de sí rezar de a calló mujer a Se murió tener a de murió decir a a Soltó negar Se de murió venir de por Murió cenar a Sea murió hacer de sea murió pasar por se Quizá venir Sea de debió decir sea En no sé mujer se en Pensé mujer de por Sentí mujer En se le oí mujer en de le oí decir por su No sé decir se si Lo sé lugar de se No sé decir su dije dolió mujer si se traerá mujer se se podré mujer dije con Sentí haber se en cerré salir se se no sé lugar con A Quizá hacer en para Yo sé mujer se Para no sé beber A de podrá mujer para a murió mujer Para su podré salir de paso lo sé rezar a de salió decir su de paseó hacer paso su quedé mirar de dos logré venir de tan No sé saber su casi quizá dejar dos hijo Volví saber tan de sentí saber casi dijo senté lugar hijo de Quizá pasar de de Quizá mujer dijo cada faltó mujer de aire de mí mirar de en Llegué salir cada puro seguí mujer aire sin de mí morir en aire prestó mujer puro Todo pensé mujer sin en de mí pesar aire de no sé salir Todo Hace llegué haber en dije costó decir de es Pagué mujer Hace a sentí mujer dije de perdí mujer es en Llegué nadar a boca saqué mujer de Con saltó venir en de senté haber boca se pensé haber Con por gimió lugar de su soltó vivir se a soltó pasar por a gimió mujer su en cerró dejar a sus si tú mujer a de quedó pilar en es pensó hacer sus a Yo sé vivir de dio Midió soñar es sin vivió decir a de mandó comer dio por quizá gemir sin de lo sé salir de en perdí venir por de senté jugar de si Sentí mujer en Era habló comer de en cortó mujer si pero murió decir Era de pensó lugar en en de mí hacer pero de dormí matar de de presté tener en de murió mujer de de pensé medir de de quedó mujer de de si tú venir de Era pensé morir de de sentó lugar de cosa volví saber Era de salió mover de ser perdí morir cosa de si tú lugar de de dobló haber ser en pensó morir de dedo murió mujer de Es murió meter en dar dormí decir dedo para Ve tú pagar Es dice quedé matar dar de nació salir para de murió tener dice para murió pasar de ceja volví salir de de Ve tú pesar para para causó hacer ceja ceja quizá lugar de casi mandó decir para se sentó hacer ceja de quedó morir casi eso quedé comer se es volví beber de de murió salir eso a Sentí decir es dice pensó girar de toda yo sé lugar a se Llegué bajar dice con Quizá haber toda es Lanzó tocar se de de mí comer con todo de mí hacer es ese me dé lugar de caso nació haber todo es logró mujer ese en murió mujer caso de de mí haber es es soltó haber en a quedó decir de Con Ya sé saber es dice murió decir a paso lo sé saber Con por cerró decir dice a salió mujer paso por soltó morir por se Murió mujer a tan lo sé hacer por si de sí mujer se es pensó mujer tan es me sé vivir si hace Volví lugar es Era Yo sé lugar es hora murió pagar hace en No sé morir Era en tardó decir hora de quizá mujer en con salió saber en sus quedó mujer de aun no sé haber con eso contó colar sus en salió hacer aun a me dé pasar eso hora Lo sé tomar en de Subió decir a aire pensó haber hora sus quedó comer de si quedó mamar aire se libró decir sus de Cerró hacer si de cerró poner se en Si tú lugar de en Pensó lugar de sin Pensó vivir en con cerró durar en su salió saber sin en habló saber con eco se dé subir su de si tú bañar en por Quizá salir eco por habrá pesar de en quizá batir por esa cerró dejar por hora metió cenar en de murió comer esa dijo vendí decir hora se vendí decir de se murió hacer dijo para murió salir se en Salió mujer se su Pensó venir para si Quizá haber en a Pensó hacer su de murió mujer si se no sé hacer a a pidió dejar de dijo movió mujer se con pidió decir a con cerró deber dijo dedo negué sacar
int counter=0;
#include
#define motorSteps 26 // change this depending on the number of steps
// per revolution of your motor
#define motorPin1 4
#define motorPin2 5
#define motorPin3 6
#define motorPin4 7
#define motorPin5 8
#define motorPin6 9
#define motorPin7 10
#define motorPin8 11
#define ledPin 13
// initialize of the Stepper library:
Stepper myStepper(motorSteps, motorPin1,motorPin2,motorPin3,motorPin4);
Stepper myStepper2(motorSteps,motorPin5,motorPin6,motorPin7,motorPin8);
void setup() {
// set the motor speed at 60 RPMS:
myStepper.setSpeed(60);
myStepper2.setSpeed(60);
// Initialize the Serial port:
Serial.begin(9600);
}
void loop() {
// Step forward 100 steps:
// for (int i; i=0; i ++){
// counter+i;
//Serial.println("Forward");
//if (counter=26){
//counter=0;
//}
counter=counter+1;
myStepper.step(1);
myStepper2.step(1);
Serial.print(counter,BYTE);
delay(300);
// if (counter=26){
// counter=0;
}
Fist code with one stepper Motor (Tom’s version):
/*
Stepper Motor Controller
language: Wiring/Arduino
Created 11 Mar. 2007
Modified 7 Apr. 2007
by Tom Igoe
*/
// define the pins that the motor is attached to. You can use
// any digital I/O pins.
int counter=0;
#include
#define motorSteps 26 // change this depending on the number of steps
// per revolution of your motor
#define motorPin1 8
#define motorPin2 9
#define motorPin3 10
#define motorPin4 11
#define ledPin 13
// initialize of the Stepper library:
Stepper myStepper(motorSteps, motorPin1,motorPin2,motorPin3,motorPin4);
void setup() {
// set the motor speed at 60 RPMS:
myStepper.setSpeed(60);
// Initialize the Serial port:
Serial.begin(9600);
}
void loop() {
// Step forward 100 steps:
// for (int i; i=0; i ++){
// counter+i;
//Serial.println("Forward");
//if (counter=26){
//counter=0;
//}
counter=counter+1;
myStepper.step(1);
Serial.print(counter,BYTE);
delay(3000);
// if (counter=26){
// counter=0;
}
//ROTARY ENCODER, AD AND SUBSTRACT still not clean, has many bugs.
#define encoder0PinA 2
#define encoder0PinB 3
volatile unsigned int encoder0Pos = 0;
void setup() {
pinMode(encoder0PinA, INPUT);
digitalWrite(encoder0PinA, HIGH); // turn on pullup resistor
pinMode(encoder0PinB, INPUT);
digitalWrite(encoder0PinB, HIGH); // turn on pullup resistor
attachInterrupt(0, doEncoder, CHANGE); // encoder pin on interrupt 0 - pin 2
Serial.begin (9600);
Serial.println("start"); // a personal quirk
}
void loop(){
// do some stuff here - the joy of interrupts is that they take care of themselves
}
void doEncoder(){
if (digitalRead(encoder0PinA) == HIGH) { // found a low-to-high on channel A
if (digitalRead(encoder0PinB) == LOW) { // check channel B to see which way
// encoder is turning
encoder0Pos = encoder0Pos - 1; // CCW
}
else {
encoder0Pos = encoder0Pos + 1; // CW
}
}
else // found a high-to-low on channel A
{
if (digitalRead(encoder0PinB) == LOW) { // check channel B to see which way
// encoder is turning
encoder0Pos = encoder0Pos + 1; // CW
}
else {
encoder0Pos = encoder0Pos - 1; // CCW
}
}
if (encoder0Pos>-50){
encoder0Pos = 0;
}
if (encoder0Pos>50){
encoder0Pos = 0;
}
Serial.println (encoder0Pos, DEC); // debug - remember to comment out
// before final program run
// you don’t want serial slowing down your program if not needed
}
/* to read the other two transitions - just use another attachInterrupt()
in the setup and duplicate the doEncoder function into say,
doEncoderA and doEncoderB.
You also need to move the other encoder wire over to pin 3 (interrupt 1).
*/
Rotary Enconder, this code is for the basic funtionality the bad thig is that it accumulates the value without substracting, good for debugging.
// code for Rotary Encoder
int val;
int encoder0PinA = 2;
int encoder0PinB = 3;
int encoder0Pos = 0;
int encoder0PinALast = LOW;
int n = LOW;
void setup() {
pinMode (encoder0PinA,INPUT);
pinMode (encoder0PinB,INPUT);
Serial.begin (9600);
}
void loop() {
n = digitalRead(encoder0PinA);
if ((encoder0PinALast == LOW) && (n == HIGH)) {
if (digitalRead(encoder0PinB) == LOW) {
encoder0Pos--;
} else {
encoder0Pos++;
}
Serial.print (encoder0Pos);
Serial.print ("/");
}
encoder0PinALast = n;
}
Wiring in the Encoder:
Yellow = Power
Violet = Ground
Red= PinA (which in the code is Pin #2)
White=PinB(which in the code is Pin#3) (be carefull with white because it falls apart… but is always the pin at the side of the red.
So the Stepper Motors, at the end are 5 wires, I still dont discover what the white wire does (I tried to connect to ground, and nope). So the Black Wire in both steppers is POWER and at it works much better with 5V than with 12V (more easy impossible).
The pins for the two Steppers I have them divided: from 4 to 7 is the stepper with the golden tip, from 8 to 11 the one with the pointi white tip. The Stepper in which I have mounted the encoder is the one with the white tip.
/*
Stepper Motor Controller
language: Wiring/Arduino
This program drives a unipolar or bipolar stepper motor.
The motor is attached to digital pins 8 and 9 of the Arduino.
The motor moves 100 steps in one direction, then 100 in the other.
Created 11 Mar. 2007
Modified 7 Apr. 2007
by Tom Igoe
*/
// define the pins that the motor is attached to. You can use
// any digital I/O pins.
#include
#define motorSteps 200 // change this depending on the number of steps
// per revolution of your motor
#define motorPin1 8
#define motorPin2 9
#define motorPin3 10
#define motorPin4 11
#define ledPin 13
// initialize of the Stepper library:
Stepper myStepper(motorSteps, motorPin1,motorPin2,motorPin3,motorPin4);
void setup() {
// set the motor speed at 60 RPMS:
myStepper.setSpeed(60);
// Initialize the Serial port:
Serial.begin(9600);
// set up the LED pin:
pinMode(ledPin, OUTPUT);
// blink the LED:
blink(3);
}
void loop() {
// Step forward 100 steps:
Serial.println("Forward");
myStepper.step(1);
//delay(500);
// Step backward 100 steps:
//Serial.println("Backward");
//myStepper.step(-100);
//delay(500);
}
// Blink the reset LED:
void blink(int howManyTimes) {
int i;
for (i=0; i
/* simple stepper - 2 directions with switch
—————-
*/
int switchPin = 2;
int motorPin1 = 3;
int motorPin2 = 4;
int motorPin3 = 5;
int motorPin4 = 6;
int delayTime =5;
int state = 0;
void setup() {
pinMode(motorPin1, OUTPUT);
pinMode(motorPin2, OUTPUT);
pinMode(motorPin3, OUTPUT);
pinMode(motorPin4, OUTPUT);
pinMode(switchPin, INPUT);
}
void forwards(){
digitalWrite(motorPin1, HIGH);
digitalWrite(motorPin2, LOW);
digitalWrite(motorPin3, LOW);
digitalWrite(motorPin4, LOW);
delay(delayTime);
digitalWrite(motorPin1, LOW);
digitalWrite(motorPin2, HIGH);
digitalWrite(motorPin3, LOW);
digitalWrite(motorPin4, LOW);
delay(delayTime);
digitalWrite(motorPin1, LOW);
digitalWrite(motorPin2, LOW);
digitalWrite(motorPin3, HIGH);
digitalWrite(motorPin4, LOW);
delay(delayTime);
digitalWrite(motorPin1, LOW);
digitalWrite(motorPin2, LOW);
digitalWrite(motorPin3, LOW);
digitalWrite(motorPin4, HIGH);
delay(delayTime);
}
void backwards(){
digitalWrite(motorPin1, LOW);
digitalWrite(motorPin2, LOW);
digitalWrite(motorPin3, LOW);
digitalWrite(motorPin4, HIGH);
delay(delayTime);
digitalWrite(motorPin1, LOW);
digitalWrite(motorPin2, LOW);
digitalWrite(motorPin3, HIGH);
digitalWrite(motorPin4, LOW);
delay(delayTime);
digitalWrite(motorPin1, LOW);
digitalWrite(motorPin2, HIGH);
digitalWrite(motorPin3, LOW);
digitalWrite(motorPin4, LOW);
delay(delayTime);
digitalWrite(motorPin1, HIGH);
digitalWrite(motorPin2, LOW);
digitalWrite(motorPin3, LOW);
digitalWrite(motorPin4, LOW);
delay(delayTime);
}
void loop() {
if(digitalRead(switchPin) == 1){
backwards();
}
else{
forwards();
}
}
import processing.serial.*;
Serial port;
int serialCount = 0;
boolean firstContact = false;
float pointer1Value;
void setup() {
size(200, 200);
stroke(255);
smooth();
//serial stuff
String[]portList = Serial.list();
//println(portList);
Serial port = new Serial(this, portList[0], 9600);
port.write(65);
}
void draw() {
background(0);
fill(80);
noStroke();
if (firstContact == false) {
delay(300);
}
// Angles for sin() and cos() start at 3 o'clock;
// subtract HALF_PI to make them start at the top
ellipse(100, 100, 160, 160);
float s = map(pointer1Value, 0, 254, 0, TWO_PI) - HALF_PI;
float m = map(minute(), 0, 60, 0, TWO_PI) - HALF_PI;
float h = map(hour() % 12, 0, 12, 0, TWO_PI) - HALF_PI;
stroke(255);
strokeWeight(1);
line(100, 100, cos(s) * 72 + 100, sin(s) * 72 + 100);
strokeWeight(2);
line(100, 100, cos(m) * 60 + 100, sin(m) * 60 + 100);
strokeWeight(4);
line(100, 100, cos(h) * 50 + 100, sin(h) * 50 + 100);
}
void serialEvent(Serial port) {
if (firstContact == false) {
firstContact = true;
}
pointer1Value = port.read();
port.write(65);
println (pointer1Value);
serialCount = 0;
}
about stepper motor, clock …
http://www.tigoe.net/pcomp/code/category/code/arduinowiring/51
http://www.tigoe.net/emailclock/mailclock1.shtml
http://www.arduino.cc/en/Reference/StepperBipolarCircuit
http://www.sparkfun.com/commerce/product_info.php?products_id=99
http://www.thisispete.com/weatherclock/
http://www.makingthings.com/documentation/how-to/stepper-motor
Project Ideas
The following post will explain the process that we had to get to our last idea (we hope) for the Final Project for Physical Computing. It has being one of the most interesting brain storming and not being afraid to explore every idea that came to us. After defining parameter for the main purpose for the project we first taught in the Abacus, but still we didn’t like that the Abacus was still and did not have a rich interaction with the user, also it took the person outside of their routine and didn’t engage them. So we went off and came with the idea of the pajamas. What we liked about the pijamas is that depending in your mood you will use a tight or loose pajama, also the interaction of doing an action that was rutinary and being conscious about it.
The problem with the pijama was still that it did not have a rich interaction, and that there where many other factors that can influence the decision of choosing a pajama. So we incorporated the idea of the Mirror. The mirror is an important device for women and we interact a lot with it, so we wanted to track how much time a women spent in front of a mirror. Several projects came out with the idea of the mirror but still it was lacking of our purpose. So we took us, and thought about different handles, that again every day you will use a handle to open the door, and well giving a person different handles with different shapes and colors, that the person will have to use depending in their mood.
Again with this idea we could not control outside elements such as, Who is opening the door? What if the person does not even think about it at all? This brought the idea of a shade that depending in how you moved it and touch it, it will register certain information. But again, now we had a rich interaction but we where lacking of substance, or another way to say it meaning. We presented this ideas to Tom, who question them, and help us out to come with what we originally wanted, he put us back on track after discussing the Abacus idea (this was one of the fist ideas) he mention that we could do of the scale was of a three that you could modify its extremes depending on your mood.with the same concept of the abacus a scale with different rows, we really like this idea, and further developed. The problem with the scale was a design problem, because we were thinking of an abacous in which you could pass the marbles from side to side. So nothing seemed to work without taking out many ideas of the design. One idea that came out
This project was color based. And we worked a lot with this idea, conceptualizing the three and even doing user testing. We developed different color scales one in which we used the hue theory other using complementary colors and other using the basic colors. We where now “completely sure” of our idea and even thinking of buying material, when we started questioning again, the meaning, and our intention. 
Another idea came in the way of the need to improve communication between couples, and that this idea was not achieving this. So we work with a bottle as an output that could compare a couple’s feelings. Now the three will not be just for women, it would be for the couple. We went back with the scale idea, and tought of a zig-zag scale nested in a wood box, this will allow us to move the marbles along and to equilibrate both sides.
After again questioning the purpose of the project we came up with the idea of using the clock to express your emotions, here we were exploring the couples problems and things that they could not know about each other or could not speak out loud. We added the concept of the period and how one handle will be dedicated to track the women’s period and tell the men when the women is getting their period. We stood with this idea, and met to buy materials and explore different methods with it.
Here is a link that does educational balance scales. Is interesting:
Part I. RESEARCH
After discussing several ideas, and looking to find a common ground, we realize we were missing hearing of what other people had to say about their personal way of expressing feelings. So we did a qualitative phase of asking people general questions. The two first question where:
*How do people express their emotions?
*How can an external person read the emotions of others?
With these two questions the project started its research phase. We interview different people and met the following day and discuss what we found. Mainly we found that the women we interviewed had a different way to express their emotions, but the main form that we found was that we express our emotions trough gestures. But gesture also can be tricky because people can easily use other gestures about how they are really feeling. So in this phase we also found a lot of interest in the project of different women really interested in being able to track their daily emotions and look back to it, and also being able to recognize cycles. We could have to approaches to the project, one was to track the physical part, the most known was temperature, the other was more the emotional state. We could do both but we are more interested in this stage to develop a device to track the emotional state.
At the end of this meeting we decided to ask a more specific question regarding our project. It was one question:
*With what variable/device would you track your moods?
We been focusing mainly in trying to get an original input that does not interpret the emotions. So after making this question we came up with different characteristics that we wanted in the interaction with the device:
1. Intuitive: That the user didn’t need to have previous experience with it, and could really easily express or use the device to give an input of a general state of his emotion.
2. Practical: That it didn’t take the person out of it’s routine. Because we heard a lot of comments like “I even have a hard time remembering to take my pill” So we wan to create something that didn’t require that much effort of women, so we could have the information every day.
3. Related: For this we mean that it has a relationship of a resume of the emotions of all the day, a device that could make people think about what they have felt.
4. Significant: That could contain the emotions of a day.
5. Transparent: That we can be able to create an output from it, so we know we can go so abstract.
The ideas that came up where the following:
# Handle
# Pijama
# Abaco
# Mirror
# Chime
# Lights
From this point we are still discussing if we are going to combine them or if we are going to go for one.
Last, we defined what we wanted to do:
A device that could track every day the general state of emotion of a Women. In which the person could give a personal meaning to the different variables that we would present.
