http://letsmakerobots.com/node/24031

Here are the steps:

• Download the almighty *.run file from Microchip
• start up a terminal
• become superuser
• go to the directory of the downloaded file
• chmod +x <filename>
• ./<filename>

Done.  One very important note, something I had forgotten a couple years back but was reminded of by way of iron fist: The “./” is not optional.  Ever.  Linux is incapable of making simple assumptions that one familiar with DOS (or even CP/M) would expect.

MPLAB X is based on NetBeans, which I’ve used in the past and found to be a very user-friendly and functional.  Hopefully I’ll enjoy this upgrade, and anticipate much better integration with open source compilers/etc.

Then it happened.

HP slapped all the loyal WebOS community members right in the face and discontinued its flagship mobile devices.  I luckily found out only 12 hours after it happened and was able to snag a Touchpad tablet before they were gone for good.  I’m writing this on it, actually.

Well, unless you’ve used WebOS you’d not believe anything I said concerning the awesomeness of its interface and the ease of use.  The truth of the matter is, a better and faster hardware dev cycle would yield the greatest group of devices ever conceived.  The OS is not yet dead, so let’s see how stupid HP can really be in losing everything from their 1.2b acquisition of palm.  Fools.

Link:  http://www.dex4u.com/Anion/AnionUSB.zip

The car is going for inspection today, a few things need to be sealed off before it’s ready for shipping.  Let’s see how they do this year.

http://www.ulpower.com/engines/ul350iS/index.html

High torque motors with a reasonable amount of HP, ideal for small aircraft.  I think they’d be fun in a small automotive application, 3L of displacement making 237 ft-lbs of torque at a low rpm would be extremely drivable, even fun.

The aircraft covered in the blog section of the site is capable of 600 nautical miles on a single tank of gas using the UL260iSA, which has some fancy oil system additions to be able to run upside down.

While not an “alternative energy”, the real focus of science and engineering should be into architectures like these, where the current fuel options are conserved and efficiency is improved.  What we’re seeing in the current hybrid crop is a group of vehicles who are only marginally more efficient in the face of immense collateral environmental impact.  On the same note, an improved engine uses the dame materials and chemicals as a conventional, so the manufacturing and disposal would be something the industry is well acquainted with, unlike the current pushing of Compact Fluorescent (CFL) light bulbs (mercury) and hybrid vehicles toting multi-kilowatt Lithium and NiMH batteries, which, if disposed of incorrectly, can contaminate thousands of gallons of water.

My hats off to these people, they’ve made some good products.

{$ x=\frac{-b\pm\sqrt{b^2-4ac}}{2a}  $}

I decided I wanted to have the same functionality found in Google Docs on my site, and not have to make equations there and move them to my server and embed them as images.  So I did some digging and found mimeTex, and and a simple recipe for wrapping the cgi into PmWiki for use there.

I like it.