Pete Brown's Blog (POKE 53280,0)
Pete Brown writes on a variety of topics from XAML with the Windows Runtime (WinRT), .NET programming using C#, WPF, Microcontroller programming with .NET Microframework, .NET Gadgeteer, Windows on Devices, and even plain old C, to raising two children in the suburbs of Maryland, woodworking, CNC and generally "making physical stuff". Oh, and Pete loves retro technology, especially Commodore (C64 and C128). If the content interests you, please subscribe using the subscription link to the right of every page.
Archive for tag:
Hobbies
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The Maker Geek Roundup aggregates information of interest to
makers everywhere. Topics include .NET Micro Framework, CNC, 3d
Printing, Robotics, Microsoft Robotics Studio, Electronics, General
Maker stuff, and more. If you have something interesting you've
done or have run across, or you blog regularly on the topics
included here, please send me the URL and brief description via the
con...
Published
Saturday, January 7, 2012 |
Tagged:
.NET, Hobbies, Synthesizer, geek, Micro+Framework, Electronics, 3d-Printing, MakerRoundup, Maker, AVR |
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In every project, there comes a part you just dread doing. It's
always the part you put off until the very end. When programming,
maybe it's that exception logging, or security interface. With most
house projects, it's painting.
With carpentry/cabinetry, well, I hate building cabinet
doors.
There. I said it. I love woodworking, but BOY do I hate doors. I
know the appropriate tricks...
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The nice thing about CNC, is you can let it run while you do
other stuff. So today, I updated the original program and ran another batch of .NET
Gadgeteer base boards. the quality was much better this time. I had
a little hiccup (maybe some EMF) for two holes in the board but it
recovered by itself after that and completed the rest. Oh, and the
feed rate didn't take until after the first...
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Today I made some more progress on the trim around the window
bench seat I built.
For reference, the wall the window is in was a blank wall when
we moved in. We had the bow window installed. I designed and built
the trim around the window, the bookcases and the bench seat all
from plywood, stock lumber, pine panels (for the seat itself) and a
little bit of trim. You can see pictures o...
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In addition to all the programming projects I have in my
backlog, plus things like migrating my website to a new provider
(and finishing migrating the old irritatedvowel hobby pages), I
have a number of fun maker-type projects I want to work on in the
near (and distant) future. In most cases, the projects would
require learning something very new - that's the appeal. If I can't
learn so...
Published
Thursday, August 18, 2011 |
Tagged:
Home-Renovation, Hobbies, CNC, Synthesis, Synthesizer, Gadgets, geek, Steam-Engines, Netduino, Micro+Framework, Robotics, Electronics |
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I have way too many hobbies. If I retired today, I’d still be really busy :) Among my hobbies is taking care of the three aquariums in the house. I have my 55 gallon tropical tank upstairs in the transition from the hall to the living room, a 55 gallon goldfish tank in my basement home office, and then my wife has a 20 gallon guppy tank in a corner of the dining room. As the 20 gallon is really...
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Fellow Silverlight enthusiast (and great author) Chad Campbell called me out on this, so now it's my turn :) How old were you when you first started programming? That was either 6th grade or 7th grade, so I was around 12. I often question the people who tell you they were hacking systems at the age of 6, but who knows? :) How did you get started in programming? The first time I ever wrote ...
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I like to mess around with computers. Every primary computer I've owned since my first 486 has been built by me (my previous computers, a 286 and a Commodore 128 were purchased). I also run a moderately complex network at my house which I realize I have never fully described anywhere. So, thought I'd tell you about it here. Why My first server was a linux box I had in our last apartment. It w...
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One of my other hobbies is woodworking (my whole upstairs is one big project right now). Thought this was funny, but I doubt I can wear it to any client sites <g>:
Published
Wednesday, February 27, 2008 |
Tagged:
Hobbies |
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I hope you all have (or had) a Merry Christmas! I just finished up helping Santa put some presents under the tree for our boy (he'll be two in February). Now I'm down here removing all the old alphas and betas and installing the latest VS and Expression tools, as well as the latest Silverlight bits. A full uninstall of VS2008 Beta 2 followed by a full install of VS20...
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My main website is pretty disjointed from my blog here, and with one exception, is rarely updated any more. I do plan to convert the main site over, prune out old stuff at somepoint, and make it as easy to update as my blog (WSS will likely be part of that solution)Anyway, the one part of my main site that does get updated on a fairly regular basis is the wallpaper subsite. This part of my...
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I'm in the middle of a never-ending home renovation project. As such, I tend to use my two Bosch drills a lot. My son (20 months old now) was obsessed with the "brrrumba" (his name for the drill, based on its sound), and would go nuts whenever I used it. So we bought him a toy drill. Unfortunately, because it had googly eyes and looked nothing like mine, he barely would use it. Wh...
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In a previous post, I mentioned that I had won an APC Netshelter server rack on eBay. I just put in a dedicated 20amp circuit to power the computers on this rack. So far, 20amps seems to be more than enough. If not, it's easy to run another as the rack is in the same room as the main panel.Here are two photos (click for larger versions) of the rack loaded with the current equipment:&nb...
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Last year, I started getting into Festool tools. Festool is a German tool company that manufactures the tools in Germany. Almost all other popular tools these days are made in asia by the lowest bidder. You pay a premium for the tools, but like nice German cars, you just can't quite match them for less. Festool is squarely targeted at professionals in Europe and abroad. In the US, the compa...
Published
Wednesday, April 4, 2007 |
Tagged:
Hobbies |
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I've updated the kitchen cabinet plans several times over the
course of construction. Here's the latest set (click to zoom):
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I installed the base corner
cabinet over the weekend. I assembled this in the kitchen as
the cabinet is pretty huge. As of now, the two installed cabinets
are the oven cabinet and the
corner cabinet. The others in the photos are the temporary
cabinets.
Like all the other cabinets, the toe kick was
assembled separately from the base. For this cabinet, it
made sen...
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I scribed the wall oven cabinet to the wall and permanently
installed it today. After that, Melissa and I hefted that oven into
the cabinet. It wasn't an easy task. I have had it sitting on a
wheeled furniture mover (basically four pieces of maple with carpet
over two of them and four wheels under it. I picked it up at
Lowes.) We wheeled it in front of the cabinet, protecting the floor
...
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During my two week vacation, I made a lot of progress on
the cabinets. I still have a few days to work before I go back, but
this is what I finished:
Redesigned the cabinet legs and some details. I'm very happy
with the design now.
Milled all the wood required for the base cabinets, minus the
peninsula
Rough cut almost all of the plywood pieces for the base
cabinets
As...
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Over the weekend, I assembled the carcass and face frame for the
double oven cabinet for our Thermador C302BS.
This was a bit of a one-off cabinet as I had to adhere to
manufacturer specs for support and spacing. The cabinet is sized
exactly for that oven. You can see from some of the photos below
that I used a sandwich of plywood to hold the weight of the oven. A
similar support ...
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Over the July 4th holiday, I managed to get some of the wainscoting installed in Ben's room. I decided to trim the alcove like I am the doors. The trim is primed 4/4" wood, except that on the inside which is unprimed 3/4". I'll paint that soon. Overall, I'm very pleased with the results with the wainscoting and the trim. I finally finished resawing all of that cabinet...
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There's nothing quite like the sound and feeling of wood you have so crisply milled you could cut your finger on the edge. You stack the wood and you get that air-cushioned "clack" sound from two pieces that are so perfectly square and true that they stick to your cast iron saw top due to the suction of the flat face. You mill a bunch of rails so perfectly sized that you can stack and rack...
Published
Monday, July 3, 2006 |
Tagged:
Hobbies |
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My father in law and I picked up the maple this past rainy Saturday. We figure it weighed in at around 2500 pounds, a little over the rating on his truck. Nevertheless, we made the almost two hour trip back in the pouring rain with no problems.The wood is currently in my basement (which is heated and open to the upstairs) acclimating. I will cut it into manageable pieces and begin the resawing ...