Researchers from New Zealand have restored the very first recording ever made of computer generated music. The three simple melodies, laid down in 1951, were generated by a machine built by the esteemed British computer scientist Alan Turing. READ MORE: Listen to the First Music Ever Made With a Computer | Gizmodo
Tag Archives: computers
#LadiesLearningCode code:mobile #Mobile #Coding Truck #Canada #2016 #tech #education #kids #fundraising #startups
The code:mobile is Ladies Learning Code’s newest and biggest initiative to inspire and educate Canadian girls and boys to become passionate builders — not just consumers of technology. Think: a travelling computer lab on wheels that will make a cross-Canada journey in 2016 teaching 10,000+ kids to code along the way.
But, it’s more than just a truck or a computer lab. It’s a cross-Canada journey that will bring hands-on, interactive technology education to Canadian youth. We believe that computer programming and other technical skills are a tool of empowerment, and it is our mission at Ladies Learning Code to ensure that all Canadians — particularly women and youth — have access to these learning opportunities.
SUPPORT THE INITIATIVE: The code:mobile – Canada’s First Coding Truck | Ladies Learning Code
Master List and Index of #Free #Programming #Books | GitHub #coding
13 #Ideas in #Fashion and #Interactive #Tech #Wearables
Beyond Wearables: New Frontiers in Interactive Tech | WIRED
IN THE FINAL months of 2014, wearable technology sparked significant media and consumer attention – not least thanks to the announcement of the Apple Watch. But as wearables move from the margins into the mainstream, it’s time to consider the next wave of interactive technology.
Programmable Clothes Are Going Commercial | Co.Design
Clothes speak volumes about us, conveying messages about wealth, taste, and personal beliefs. So in this age of ubiquitous screens and social sharing, it’s no surprise that textiles have become another platform for electronic communication. But two new efforts are commercializing the technology, creating consumer fashions that allow the wearer to project any electronic text or image she desires.
Somehow Teen Girls Get the Coolest Wearable Out There | WIRED
JEWELBOTS ARE BRACELETS with programmable plastic flowers made for middle-school girls. They’re also the most interesting wearable I’ve seen this year. Their creators describe them as “friendships bracelets that teach girls to code.”
This Jacket Is a Dream Come True and I Need It Now | Jezebel
The BauBax jacket—which CNN quite accurately refers to as “the Swiss Army knife of
travel wear”—which debuted on Kickstarter last week with a goal of raising $20,000. They have since raised over $600,000 because it is a stunningly good idea. The jacket contains 15 pockets and a slew of built-in doodads.
These Strange Clothes Came Out of a Regular Old 3-D Printer | WIRED
Paired with new cellular structures being devised by 3-D printing re
searchers, the material allowed Peleg to create “lace-like textiles” that she could work with
“just like cloth.” She printed them using a Witbox—a $1,800 machine. [Image: Danit Peleg]
These Mathematical Scarves Are Designed By a Computer Algorithm | Gizmodo
It’s still summer, but these mathematical merino scarves designed with a computer algorithm are getting us in the mood for colder temps. They’re called KnitYak: black-and-white merino scarves that each have a snowflake-unique design that’s generated by a computer algorithm.
A Paper-Thin Solar Panel Can Charge Your Phone on the Go | Lifehacker
Solar panels keep getting lighter and tinier—good news for rugged on-the-go types who can charge their devices on the trail with sun-fueled chargers. And this particular solar charger on Kickstarter is so thin, you can slip it in your Lonely Planet while it feeds your phone battery.
Disney’s $1 Billion Bet on a Magical Wristband | WIRED
The MagicBands look like simple, stylish rubber wristbands offered in cheery shades of grey, blue, green, pink, yellow, orange and red. Inside each is an RFID chip and a radio like those in a 2.4-GHz cordless phone. The wristband has enough battery to last two years. It may look unpretentious, but the band connects you to a vast and powerful system of sensors within the park.
New Process Can Print Stretchy Electronics Onto Your Clothes | TechCrunch
Researchers at the University of Tokyo have created a single-step process to print conductive material on cloth, allowing manufacturers to build stretchable wearables that can test vital signs like heart rate and muscle contraction.
Google’s Project Jacquard Aims To Make “Activewear” A Reality | ReadWriteWeb
What’s really fascinating about Project Jacquard…the clothing itself ought to be an interactive thing. It ought to provide us an opportunity to interact with devices around us. That’s the breakthrough that Project Jacquard is really talking about—now, instead of just passive data collection, your clothing is an opportunity for you to interact with devices.
Sensory Fiction | Felix | VIMEO
Sensory fiction is about new ways of experiencing and creating stories. Traditionally, fiction creates and induces emotions and empathy through words and images. By using a combination of networked sensors and actuators, the Sensory Fiction author is provided with new means of conveying plot, mood, and emotion while still allowing space for the reader’s imagination.
How to Print a Super-Thin Touchscreen Display on Just About Anything | Gizmodo
[T]his award-winning paper is perhaps the coolest we’
ve seen: It lays out a new technique for printing cheap, simple touchscreen displays with conventional printers. It’s called PrintScreen, and it’s a system that allows the user to print on nearly a
ny material.
From The Designers Of Fitbit, A Digital Tattoo Implanted Under Your Skin | Co.Design
We asked NewDealDesign, the design consultancy behind projects like the Fitbit line of activity trackers, and Google’s modular Project Ara smartphone, what things might look like when technology and fashion reach beyond the wrist. In response, they created Project Underskin. It’s a concept for a smart digital tattoo which would be implanted in your hand and interact with everything you touch. It can unlock your front door, trade data with a handshake, or even tell you if you have low blood sugar.
Related
What Emotion-Reading #Computers Are Learning About Us | Fast Company #emotionalintelligence
https://embed-ssl.ted.com/talks/rana_el_kaliouby_this_app_knows_how_you_feel_from_the_look_on_your_face.html
Rana el Kaliouby, a Cambridge- and MIT-trained scientist and leader in facial-recognition technology, is concerned about how computers are affecting the emotional lives of her two small children.
There is much research that suggests that emotional intelligence develops from social interactions, yet children are increasingly spending their days in front of computers, tablets, and smartphones. Today, children under the age of eight spend on average two full hours a day in front of screens. El Kaliouby is deeply concerned about what happens when children grow up around technology that does not express emotion and cannot read our emotion. Does that cause us, in turn, to stop expressing emotion?
The answer, according to recent research, is yes. A University of California-Los Angeles study last year found that children who had regular access to phones, televisions, and computers were significantly worse at reading human emotions than those who went five days without exposure to technology.
But El Kaliouby does not believe the solution lies in ridding the world of technology. Instead, she believes we should be working to make computers more emotionally intelligent.
READ MORE: What Emotion-Reading Computers Are Learning About Us | Fast Company | Business + Innovation
At last, the Raspberry Pi Mini PC Has An Official Case | Engadget #RaspberryPi #tech
There’s no question that the Raspberry Pi is successful among the homebrew computing crowd. However, it’s not what you’d call consumer-friendly — the bare circuit board you normally get is clearly intended for tinkerers who plan to put the mini PC inside their own projects. Mercifully, you won’t have to devise a shell for it (or run it exposed) for much longer. READ MORE: At last, the Raspberry Pi mini PC has an official case | Engadget
This $169 Computer Is Designed For The World’s Emerging Middle Class | Co.Exist #computers
On a trip to India, entrepreneur Matt Dalio noticed something about the country’s emerging middle class: While many families owned TVs, few could also afford to have a computer. He had an epiphany. Why not make TV screens double as the monitor for a low-cost, but fully-functioning PC?
For the next three years, he worked with a team to develop Endless, a $169 computer designed for the burgeoning middle class in the developing world. It’s loaded with around 150 apps—from health and farming to Wikipedia—that can work offline, so if someone has a spotty Wi-Fi connection, they can keep working.
READ MORE: This $169 Computer Is Designed For The World’s Emerging Middle Class | Co.Exist | ideas + impact.
Check Out This Coding Toy—For Grownups | ReadWrite @TeamKano #coding #diy #makerspaces #tech
I think its a very smart marketing move for Kano to launch products that are gender and age neutral. I volunteer with my public library’s CoderDojo program, which is for 9 to 17 year olds. One of the participant’s parents has actually stayed to learn as well. Its heartwarming to see parent and child learning new concepts together. Learning to code, makerspaces, hackfests, arduino…these activities are fun and instructive for all ages and can be a family activity too.
Kickstarted into existence in 2013, with a campaign that blasted through its $100,000 goal with $1.5 million in pledges, Kano now makes Raspberry Pi–based computer kits commercially available to children ages 6 to 14. Inspired by those young users, who founder Alex Klein says have created and shared as many as 5 million lines of code, he wants to spread that enthusiasm to a larger audience.
Engineering kits have been popular among kids and a natural fit in the educational space. Likewise, Kano set out following in the footsteps of companies like Little Bits, Adafruit, and Goldie Blox. But Klein now wants to extend Kano’s reach, taking it into grown-up territory. Simply put, he wants to appeal to everyone’s inner “inventor and tinkerer,” he said.
Klein wants to push into the adult maker market by putting out products that are both gender- and age-neutral. The core design, he hopes, speaks to fundamental human impulses: “Everyone has shared urges to look inside,” he said. “Everyone wants to take control. Everyone wants to make and play.”
Kano’s next stage of evolution will involve some fundamental shifts. The company is expanding its line-up with new add-on kits, and plans to open up Kano Blocks—its game-making arena—and online platform Kano World to community development.
All Kano products run on Kano OS, the open source operating system that sits on top of Raspberry Pi. It boasts high computational powers that let it run fast, boot quickly and offer clear graphical rendering. For developers, this means that they will have ample resources to jump on board and quickly create their own projects. Kano World allows for the Kano community to share their creations and add on to existing projects.
READ MORE: Check Out This Coding Toy—For Grownups | ReadWrite
C.H.I.P. — The super tiny computer that only costs $9 [@Kickstarter] | Mashable #makerspaces @nextthingco
If you thought the $35 Raspberry Pi 2 was a small and cheap computer, think again. Next Thing Co.’s open-source C.H.I.P. is an even smaller barebones microcomputer that only costs $9.
Like the Raspberry Pi, C.H.I.P. can be used in a variety of ways. Connect the necessary parts — a keyboard, mouse, and a display — to it and it becomes a personal computer. Otherwise, you can hack it into a retro games emulator, or robot, or whatever you can dream up. Next Thing Co. encourages users to learn how to code and make things with C.H.I.P.
Next Thing Co. is currently crowdfunding C.H.I.P. through a Kickstarter campaign. At the time of this writing, the project has successfully reached its $50,000 funding goal with 29 days to go. The first C.H.I.P computers are expected to start shipping in December.
READ MORE: C.H.I.P. — the super tiny computer that only costs $9 | Mashable
Chef Watson Dishes Up Unique Recipes Using Cognitive Computing | LifeHacker @IBMChefWatson #recipes
IBM’s Watson is a cognitive computer designed to handle complex problems and learn from and interact with humans. And, with the Chef Watson app, it can create novel recipes through an understanding of food science and people’s taste preferences.
READ MORE: Chef Watson Dishes Up Unique Recipes Using Cognitive Computing | LifeHacker
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