The awesome guys from the Two Hands Projects unexpectedly dropped into Harford Hackerspace last night. The organizer, Bilal, was full of energy and really pumped everyone up. You’ll have to wait for the video to see what happened. Hopefully we will make the cut. In a nutshell they interviewed us and we showed off our space and our projects. Here are a few photos of them getting ready to record.

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I know I’m bad with these photo updates. Mostly because I am having too much fun at the Hackerspace that I just forget to take photos. I took a lot more photos than these but it turns out that my flash card was bad and my camera never let me know. I’ll try to recover those images later.

So, last week we finished building the Y axis for our CNC project and we talked about launching a payload into near space. Before that we built a Corstarch Monster for Electronica Fest and we were messing with some PIC kits (microncontrollers) using speakers and LCDs as outputs. Now that I have a new phone which actually takes decent photos (the above were taken with my Palm Pre) I will probably be able to share more of our hackerspace with those of you who don’t like to leave your computer chair.

Before we get to this topic I want to remind our guest that we meet every Wednesday at 7pm. Contact us if you are interested in coming.

We were never using our forum yet we were getting lots of spammers signing up for it. So I have disabled the forum and removed the link to it. We do have a mailing list but it’s kept private and is only for people who want to participate. E-mail and tell us all about you then you can get on the list.

Our Wiki and this blog will remain the two main methods of communication. The blog is more for a snap shot at what we have done and what we will be doing. The wiki is more for the business side of things such as how we raise funds and event planing.

Harford Hackerspace will have a table at Electronica Fest 2009. Check the official website for details. http://www.nem-electronicafest.com/

If you have been following our progress and have not been able to make our Thursday meetings then maybe Wednesday will work for you. Starting on August 12th 2009 our weekly meetings will be moving to Wednesday nights at 7pm. Contact info@harfordhackerspace.org.

Unfortunately, all the photos I took of our CNC Build over the last two weeks were currupted. Hopefully, I will get some photos this week for your enjoyment. It’s coming along nicely. We have added black paint which looks really nice with all the aluminum on it. We have started the y-axis by adding the y-bracket, y-rails, and y-bearings. We have also designed remaining components and are waiting for them to be cut.

Also, we have tested the X-Axis, Motor Controller, and Mach3 Software and all in working well.

If you’ve ever come across an OpenSource or OpenHardware project then you have probably heard of Sourcforge. I have to admit that I have know about Sorceforge and (Sub)version Control for years but I could never figure out why someone would want to use something so complex. I finally figured it out…it’s because Sourceforge and Version control is not at all complex. In fact it is actually very cool.  In order to use Sourceforge you’ll need a subversion (SVN) client. TortoiseSVN is the self proclaimed “coolest interface to (sub)version control”. This tutorial will get you up and running quickly with an existing Sourceforge project. You will be able to Checkout entire projects and have an exact copy on your local PC for editing and you will also learn how to Add files and Commit changed files (continue reading…)

First, we would like to thank Loyala College in Maryland for their generous donation of a IBM Laptop.

We were all very excited to learn that the IBM laptop came with a built in parallel port. However, after a few hours of hacking and puting the stepper motor on the CNC we found out that the laptops port is not compatible with our CNC. So we will need to resort to a desktop for now. We loaded the laptop with Windows and Linux and I’m sure we will find a million other uses for it.

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Just a friendly reminder that we will be meeting this Thursday, 7:30pm @ the garage. If you are new and would like to join us e-mail info@harfordhackerspace.org for details.

I could not help but smile really big during yesterdays meeting. There was the real feeling of a hackerspace with Miles building a prop gun, all of us pitching in on the CNC Machine and a few of us tearing into a work related project of mine. Then to top it all off Logan from Baltimore SDIY stoped by and demonstrated his projects. We all had a great time.

Now we need to take th CNC apart and paint it.

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Nick Farr stoped by Harford Hackerspace and shed some light on the 501(c)(3) process. He also shared some “good practice” points with us and The Node. Prior to Nicks arrival Harford Hackerspace and The Node had a long conversation about how the two organizations could collaborate or possibly merge. There was a lot of repetative questions asked but very little answers came of the discusssion.

Several members from both organizations put on the table the possible merge so long as the two organizations could agree on a suitable location. As of the end of the meeting on July 11th an agreement was not reached on the merge but both organizations agreed that our goals were similar and we would help each other in our efforts. A merge is not out of the question but it’s also not likely to happen in the immediate future. However the offer is still on the table from Harford Hackerspaces perspective.

Now that that intense meeting is over Harford Hackerspace will resume its normal activities on July 16  @ 7:30 pm in the Temporary Hackerspace Garage. E-mail info@harfordhackerspace.org if you ever want to attend any meetings. We may even be able to schedule a meeting around your calendar.