[IAEP] [support-gang] What Sensors and Where To Buy?

[Yama Ploskonka]

the problem with the "let them learn by making mistakes" is that they 
may not know *WHAT* mistake they made, and how to fix it.
Random chance events need eons, billions of years, to get to an advanced 
civilization. Good design needs only a few millenia!

The standard response to no-idea-what-went-wrong is to give up on this 
and take on another different pursuit - If it were not that way, we'd 
have more kid programmers than the handful we do, after about 2 million 
attempts times several years.

Another example: by the merest chance, I had switched the MSP430 chips 
in the Launchpad experimentation board, before I tested it with the XO.
This was serendipitous: last year, the Fedora version did not allow the 
most updated MSP430 software, so it would not have worked with the newer 
chip, the one that comes preinstalled in the Launchpad. Because I had 
switched them, I had the older chip on, that fateful day, and /things 
worked!!/

Otherwise, I'd have given up on the MSP430 and moved on.

Why is that important? the MSP430 Launchpad is $4.30 US dollars, 
shipping included to anywhere in the world.

It is a full fledged microcontroller experimentation board, it is 
shipped ready to use (includes a USB cable and an extra MCU). It works 
out of the box with an XO - you need to install two small software 
packages in the XO, but that's not so hard (and it is easier now that 
they fixed the Fedora repository link). With the new version we have, 
/all/ MSP430G work now.
For those interested in building a robot "brain" (and many other such 
mechatronic projects), we have now an affordable solution, at a fraction 
of the cost of Arduino & Co.

basic install instructions (I wrote this one - need to update it!):
http://processors.wiki.ti.com/index.php/OLPC_XO-1
Buy the MSP430 Launchpad
https://estore.ti.com/Product3.aspx?ProductId=2031
experimentation code examples
http://processors.wiki.ti.com/index.php/MSP430_LaunchPad_%28MSP-EXP430G2%29
launchpad msp430 projects
http://www.43oh.com/
http://e2e.ti.com/group/microcontrollerprojects/m/msp430microcontrollerprojects/default.aspx?GalleryPostSort=Views&PageIndex=1



On 09/20/2012 08:18 PM, James Cameron wrote:
> You can generally learn by experience, which comes from ordering the
> wrong ones and realising you made a mistake.  ;-)
>
> I've added a few more words to some of those pages.
>
> The devices needed are usually commonly available from many sources,
> so I would not bother to list them, since the information would become
> rapidly dated and country-specific.
>
> On Thu, Sep 20, 2012 at 05:37:45PM -0700, Caryl Bigenho wrote:
>> Hi?
>>
>>
>> OK, here I am again with another "dumb" question? well, maybe not so dumb after
>> all as I'll bet there are others out there who could also use this information.
>> On the OLPC wiki there are several very nicely illustrated instructions about
>> how to make sensors to use with the XO? temperature, humidity, light, etc.
>> But, they don't include a materials list or reference to sources where the
>> parts can be purchased.
>>
>>
>> http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Making_XO_sensors
>>
>>
>> Radio Shack? Edmond Scientific? Parallax.com? or where? Curious people, myself
>> included want to know. Can someone help here?
>>
>>
>> Thanks!
>>
>> Caryl (GrannieB)
>>
>>
>> P.S. Here's an example of the type of info needed. This site sells a number of
>> light sensors but they call them things like Photoresistor, Photo Transistor,
>> Light to Frequency Converter. These are all little ones that appear similar to
>> the one in the instructions on the wiki. How do you tell which kind you need?
>>
>>
>> http://www.parallax.com/Store/Sensors/ColorLight/tabid/175/List/0/CategoryID/50
>> /Level/a/SortField/0/Default.aspx
>>
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>