Recent Posts

The Soul of a New Machine: The BSides Lisbon Badge Story

on January 3, 2019

When an attendee builds one of our badges, they’ve usually learned a whole load of new skills in the process. They’ll have learned how to solder, about the various components on the board and they have a personal stake in the badge. For many people a self-built badge is a piece of personal pride and many of the badges we’ve designed take pride of place back at the office.

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A Very Hacky Christmas Tree: Part II

on December 12, 2017

Last week we built a set of beautiful Christmas tree lights. You can reprogram, and reuse these all year round. But what’s cooler than beautiful Christmas tree lights? How about Christmas tree lights that change based on what’s happening around the tree? Adding light sensors to your tree lights should take between half an hour and an hour from start to finish. We put together a HIDIOT photoresistor tutorial a while back.

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A Very Hacky Christmas Tree: Part I

on December 8, 2017

This year we made our own Christmas tree lights. They’re really easy to build, and can be reprogrammed to be used all year round. Read on to find out how to make your own! When finished, you should have your own programmable Christmas tree lights! Then you can take it further and make it your own! Our Christmas tree lights are different to the ones you get in the shop.

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Ghost Hunting With The HIDIOT

on October 30, 2017

Ghost hunters use EMF meters as an essential tool. According to the Anomolies Research Society, indicators of paranormal activity include fluctuations in EMF detection readings and background readings that drop or spike for no reason, with no explainable cause. What we’ll build We’re going to build an EMF detector, so we’re building our own analogue sensor from scratch. We’ll also look at how we can use Digital Signal Processing (DSP) techniques to improve our detector.

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