The Future of the Native App (in my uneducated opinion)

As the world of software progresses, all of us have probably noticed a shift in how we interact with our computers. We find ourselves interacting with our phones more than our computers, the internet more than our software, and we've increasingly demanded access to everything always. As such, important concepts like "Web 2.0", "The Cloud", and "Convergence" have been developed to facilitate such a transition. But, with the advent of all of these concepts, is the art of the native application on its last legs?

Stream Raymarine's Multifunction Displays Anywhere

Raymarine's electronics are not very secure. This is no secret, but there really isn't a drive to reverse engineer or hack them. But the way they're selling their high end solutions for a large amount of money is ridiculous. What even is "SeaTalk"? It's a serial connection. They could have done the same thing with ethernet or just a few wires. It's all a market cornering money grab. So I decided to try and imitate what (I think) is one of their more expensive features: viewing the MFD on a TV screen.

Making a Computer Monitor out of an iPad

People want to upgrade their iPhones and iPads when the new versions are released. This happens pretty much every year. Where do the old devices go? Recycled or resold, often. Much recycled e-waste ends up shipped somewhere it's not disposed of properly. So whenever I can make something useful out of something that isn't useful and reduce the burden on e-waste dumps, I jump at the opportunity. So when I saw that I could make a display out of an iPad, I was excited, because I knew that there'd be quite a few of these available in the condition I needed them in.

More Optical Media Drive Salvage

I started writing this about two and a half years ago. I'm posting it now so I can clean out my 'Draft' folder on blogger. Lots of the stuff doesn't still apply, but I figured I'd finish writing it with what I had and just post it.

Reverse Engineering HP PCIe Mezzanine Cards - Part 1

This is a big project that's way above my electrical pay-grade. Am I going to do it? Yes. Will it work by the end? Maybe. I've heard conflicting rumors about how tolerant PCIe is supposed to be. One quote I've heard is that you can run PCIe over a wet string. But that might not be the case for server hardware like the HP Blades. But we'll burn that bridge when we come to it. For now, we need to figure out what we're doing and how we're going to do it.

100

This is the 100th post on this blog. It's nothing special, but I just wanted to take a minute to take stock of the things I'm working on and further confirm my decision to switch to a once-per-month posting cadence to make the blogposts better and more complete.

WiFi Enabled Alarm Clock - Part 1

Alarm Clocks are simple devices - they beep occasionally at a specific time. So it's probably not hard to make one. But what if we had a WiFi connected Alarm Clock? Something that would make "Internet of Things" an actual buzz word. Get it? Alarm clocks buzz... ha... okay, I guess not. Let's just get on with the build.