Ikea’s not the only place you can get a build-your-own-furniture puzzle. If you’re into the whole open source thing, there’s a new repository of completely free furniture designs that are ripe for the downloadin’. The only hurdle? You have to actually make the pieces before you can put ’em together.
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An LED Matrix Display is a very affordable and versatile tool for showing information. But Stephen Wylie and Stacy Devino made an even more affordable and useful version of it. They call it LEDgoes, a display that you can expand by snapping modules together like LEGO.
Each module measures 1.5″ x 2″ and has 35 LEDs that can display red, green or yello. You can connect boards in real-time and even stack up to two rows as one. They also each have two ATMega microcontrollers as well as 26 hackable GPIO pins.
Out of the box, you can type a message to display on your LEDgoes using a PC or mobile device, or you can sync it to a Twitter or RSS feed. But because they’re ready to be hacked, you can make your own apps and display whatever you want on them.
Pledge at least $29 (USD) on Kickstarter to get a LEDgoes kit with two small display panels as a reward.
The project known as Ubuntu Edge is a dual-booting Ubuntu/Android smartphone that may or may not make its way to the real world due to its slightly under-funded initiative for action – but that’s not stopping early adopters from showing the machine off in a set of up-close photos. What you’re seeing here is the […]
As spoken of early on in the initial announcements of NVIDIA’s gaming handheld SHIELD, the company has made good on their promise to allow full software modification and hacking with the release of open source downloads this week. What this actually means is that NVIDIA is making it rather easy for the development community as […]
Back in January, we heard about the mobile variant of the Ubuntu operating system and Canonical’s plan to launch phones that double as Ubuntu desktop PCs when docked. Now the company is launching the most ambitious crowdfunding campaign yet. It hopes to raise $32 million to release the high-end Ubuntu Edge smartphone.
Aside from the mind-boggling target amount, Canonical’s crowdfunding campaign is also unique in that the Ubuntu Edge will be given only to the backers; it won’t be sold to anyone else or released commercially. The Edge is meant to be a testbed for cutting edge technology, and I suppose to convince other smartphone makers that there is a legitimate demand for Ubuntu phones. To that end, Canonical aims to pack the best hardware it can on the Edge. It will have a multi-core CPU, 4GB RAM, 128GB of storage and two LTE antennas (one for US and one for Europe, so you can take advantage of LTE in more countries).
As we found out in January, Ubuntu smartphones will also run Android. This makes it very enticing for Android phone owners to try out the new OS: you still have access to all your apps and media, but you can also peek into the future. And that future comes in the form of a hardware dock and the desktop Ubuntu operating system. Dock the Ubuntu Edge into any monitor with an HDMI port and voila, you’re running Ubuntu. All you need is a keyboard and mouse. You can keep using Android or Ubuntu mobile on the phone while you’re using the Ubuntu desktop OS.
Pledge at least $775 (USD) on Indiegogo to get an Ubuntu Edge smartphone as a reward, and get a chance to see for yourself how far the penguin has come.
[via Acquire]
We knew good and well it was coming, and now we’ve both a date and a launch partner to hone in on: that’s “tomorrow” and “T-Mobile Poland,” respectively. After going big (as opposed to home) at Mobile World Congress earlier this year, Mozilla has just announced that the Firefox OS-powered Alcatel One Touch Fire will ship tomorrow in Poland for 1 zloty (practically free, for those curious) in combination with “a very attractive tariff.” Market launches in additional European countries will follow in the fall, with German handsets to be marketed via Deutsche Telekom’s second brand congstar. DT’s subsidiaries in Hungary (Magyar Telekom) and Greece (COSMOTE) will also initiate sales of the handset this fall, but pricing in those regions has yet to be revealed. As for word on a US release via Sprint? Still waiting, sadly.
Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile
Via: Mozilla
Source: Deutsche Telekom
The first Firefox OS smartphones, the Alcatel One Touch Fire and the ZTE Open, will hit the market “soon” Mozilla has confirmed this morning, promising imminent launches from Duetsche Telekom and Telefonica. The two new handsets run Mozilla’s own alternative to Android, Firefox OS, taking a web-centric perspective on apps and services in order to
Mozilla is, unsurprisingly, pretty keen on open-source, and its latest release isn’t an updated Firefox version but a set of collaborative office kit as part of the new Open Source Furnitures Project. Designed by Mozilla and NOSIGNER for the browser company’s new Japanese offices, the furniture – which includes desks, wooden flooring with integrated cable
If you’re struggling to find the right furniture for your place, consider making your own—from Mozilla’s very own pool of open source designs.
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Electric vehicle charging stations aren’t cheap: one of the most affordable Level 2 (240V) units sells for $450 and only supplies 16A. Electric Motor Works (EMW) — which is best known for its electric conversion kits — wants to change this with JuiceBox, a 15kW Level 2 EV charger that costs just $99 in kit form (plus $10 shipping). The device, which is launching on Kickstarter today, supplies up to 62A and operates on both 120V and 240V. It’s built around an Arduino microcontroller and EMW is making both the hardware and software open source.
But wait, there’s more! The company is also crowdfunding a Premium Edition of JuiceBox ($199 in kit form) which adds time-of-day charging, a color LCD, ground-fault plus output protection (for outdoor use) and a unique enclosure (hopefully as funky as the one in the picture above). While the DIY kits only require basic assembly and soldering skills, you’ll be able to buy fully assembled versions for $100 more. At $329 (shipped), a ready-to-use JuiceBox Premium Edition undercuts other similar charging stations by several hundred dollars. The catch? You’ll have to supply your own cables (or buy them separately from EMW), including one with a standard J1772 EV connector. Hit the source link below to check out the campaign, and take a look at the PR after the break.
Filed under: Transportation
Source: EMW (Kickstarter)
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