Category: Learning

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October 6, 2018 Adafruit’s Circuit Playground Express

Saturday, October 6, 2018

10:00am
Q-College, Suite 303 – 771 Vernon Ave, Victoria, BC

A shallow Dive into Adafruit’s Circuit Playground Express
The Circuit Playground Express is a small, cheap($32) dev board from Adafruit Industries designed to introduce electronics and programming to the novice. It’s built around an ATSAMD21 ARM Cortex MO processor and is programmable with either circuitpython or Microsoft’s ‘Makecode’ block programming interface. The board also houses a variety of sensors (motion, temperature, light, touch), buttons, a slide switch and IR transmit/receive capability. In this presentation I’ll demo some of the easier projects that I’ve mastered and maybe include something using the Adafruit Crickit, and add-on board for the CPX designed for simple robotics.  See the reading list here.
Hosted by Paul and Craig Miller

Meetup Sign Up

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September 22, 2018 – ESP8266 Web Controlled LEDs (part 1)

10:00am
Camosun College
Bldg: Technology Bldg, Room: Tech 259 – 4461 Interurban Rd, Victoria, BC (parking at lot 8 for park users) presentation pdf

led

In this session, we’ll cover programming Neopixel LEDs driven by the ESP8266 using a Web Interface. We’ll cover the hardware interface to the LEDs as well as the web interface (running on the ESP8266 utilizing the PL9823).

In Part2, we’ll harden the installation by adding TLS/SSL and IPv6 support via NodeRed running on a Pi

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May 26, 2018 – R part 2

10:00am
Q-College
Suite 303 – 771 Vernon Ave, Victoria, BC

Two views of Statistical Programming. The second in the series. R is a programming language and free software environment for statistical computing and graphics that is supported by the R Foundation

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Intro to Pi and Others – March 20, 2018

6:00 PM to 7:00 PM
Q-College
Suite 303 771 Vernon Ave, Victoria, BC

Intro to Pi & Others is a short monthly session to help get you up and running with your Pi or Other (embedded device). It is an unstructured hour-long session where you can ask questions, bring in your Pi or Other (and power supply), and get help with your project.

This month, learn the basics of GPIO and how to turn on/off a LED. We have extra green projects boards and LEDs to use. See you on March 20th!

LED Presentation

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March 10, 2018 – Intro 1 to Statistical Computing using R & Python

10:00am
Q-College
Suite 303 – 771 Vernon Ave, Victoria, BC

Two views of Statistical Programming.  Python using Panda & PyNum libraries for statistical computing. And a following meeting,  (28 April) with R  a programming language and free software environment for statistical computing and graphics that is supported by the R FoundationTwo views of Statistical Programming.

See presentation pdf s here.

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Dec 9, 2017 – Esp8266 Over The Air Programming

9:30 AM

ESP8266 OTA (Over the Air) Updates with Arduino IDE.  OTA update is the process of loading a new firmware to ESP8266 module using WiFi connection rather than a serial communication. This type of functionality is extremely useful in case of no physical access to the ESP module.

This presentation, by Greg Lawrance, will include a hands on session for those who want to learn more. Please bring your PI, and preload the software referred to in the meetup announcement.

Presentation Notes

http://vicpimakers.ca/projects/esp8266-over-the-air-programming/

Q-College
Suite 303 771 Vernon Ave, Victoria, BC

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Intro to Pi & Others #2 – Tues Nov 21

Tuesday, November 21, 2017
6:00 PM to 7:00 PM
Q-College
Suite 303 771 Vernon Ave, Victoria, BC

Intro to Pi & Others is a short monthly session to help get you up and running with your Pi or Other (embedded device). It is an unstructured hour-long session where you can ask questions, bring in your Pi or Other (and power supply), and get help with your project.

We plan on holding these sessions once a month on a Tuesday night. If you are looking for a bit of help, this session is for you.

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Sep 23, 2017 – ODROID

Saturday, 9:30am

Q-College
Suite 303 – 771 Vernon Ave, Victoria, BC (map)

Introductiion to the ODROID, a ARM 64bit 1.5Ghz quad core single board computer!

The most advanced architecture for mobile devices and embedded 64-bit computing. Featuring 1.5Ghz cortex-A53 cores, high-performance 2Gbyte DDR3 SDRAM, Gigabit Ethernet and eMMC5.0 HS400

Also, Kali Linux, the Security Distro will be reviewed, and will demo some of the tools.

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Thank You Q College

Manny Mandrusiak and Deid Reimer

June 24, 2017

 Q Academy’s Manny Mandrusiak, Executive Director, and Leaoni Webb, Education Director provide a warm welcome and all the essentials for our Saturday morning gatherings. Thank you for being there Manny and Leaoni. Here’s a little something in appreciation of your hospitality.

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June 10, 2017 – Project Day

Saturday, June 10, 2017
9:30 AM

Q-College
Suite 303 771 Vernon Ave, Victoria, BC

Please join us for a discussion/learning day about embedded projects. Bring in your Raspberry Pi’s, ESP8266, Arduino, whatever, and ask/answer questions and share what you are doing.

Look forward to seeing you there!

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May 13, 2017 – IPv6 Part 2

IPv6 Fundamentals Tutorial (part 2)

  • Saturday,  May 13, 2017

    9:30 AM

Q-College

Suite 303 771 Vernon Ave, Victoria, BC (map)

We’ll recap what we learned in Part 1, and then expand our knowledge of how IPv6 really is different from IPv4 by learning about:

• Router Advertisements – Good info from the router

• Dive into DNS a bit more, learning about AAAA records

• Sniffing the network with wireshark

Resource: Craig Miller

See the full IPv6 tutorial  (all parts) on www.makikiweb.com

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April 8, 2017 – File Systems on the Pi

The Basics of Filesystems on the Pi

  • 9:30 AM

    Victoria Computer Club

    85A Burnside Rd West (at Wascana), Victoria, BC (map)

    Filesystems is what keeps track of the files on your Raspberry Pi. Linux supports several types of filesystems (including the ones used by Macintosh and Windows).

    Chris K. will cover the basics of filesystems in the context of the Pi. We will look at the boot sequence, types of filesystems and their specific usages, and then we will dive into the structure of the both the boot and root filesystem (rootfs) partitions.

    See the presentation material here.

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March 25, 2017 – Python Webservers

Python Webservers

  • Saturday, March 25, 2017

    9:30 AM

    Location:  Q-College

    Suite 303 771 Vernon Ave, Victoria, BC (map)

    Hayward will be talking about Python Webservers.  The presentation will cover the basics of what they are, how they differ from a traditional web server, and provide examples of (and discussion around) some projects that he has setup using a python web server.

    Presentation material is here.

    http://hayward.peirce.me/python-web-framework-presentation/

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January 14, 2017 – Blinky Lights on BSD

Blinky Lights on BSD (Beaglebone Black)

Saturday, January 14, 2017
9:30 AM

Victoria Computer Club
85A Burnside Rd West (at Wascana), Victoria, BC (map)

If you ever had questions on how to integrate multiple devices together with 21st century security all controlled via a simple (looking) Android App, you won’t want to miss this meeting.

Join us for a similar but different demonstration of controlling LEDs running on one of the “Others” (a Beaglebone Black) using SSH and BSD. If that wasn’t enough, Mark G will also be showing a Raspberry Pi camera used to confirm that state of the LED, all under the control of a custom Android App.

See the full project here.

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November 26, 2016 – Analogue Inputs

Analogue Inputs on the Pi

  • Saturday, November 26, 2016

    9:30 AM

  • Q-College

    Suite 303 771 Vernon Ave, Victoria, BC (map)

  • The Raspberry Pi has 30 GPIO pins, but none of them are analogue inputs. At this meeting, we’ll take a deeper look at how to take an analogue signal (like temperature) and connect it to the Pi, and access it via Python.

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November 12th Meeting: IoT Streaming

Raspberry Pi and IoT Streaming

The Internet of Things (IoT) is a hot topic. Join us, as we continue to explore the vast world of IoT using the Raspberry Pi. This weeks session will focus on IoT devices streaming data over the internet.

Saturday, November 12th, 2016
9:30 AM
Victoria Computer Club
85A Burnside Rd West (at Wascana), Victoria, BC

A full writeup for this presentation is available on the presenters website.

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Animatronics Course

Animatronics Course (at Makerspace)

uviclogo
January 28, 2016 to March 24, 2016 (6:30 PM – 8:30 PM)
9 sessions on Thursday

Location: Vancouver Island Technology Park
Instructor: James Jacoby
Expected Class Size: 12
Register at UVIC Continuing Studies HERE
Movie special effects abound with monsters and robots that roar and move and react to people in the scenes with them. Learn how to make your own animatronic creations! This course will teach you how to program the Arduino microcontroller, a tiny computer that can connect to sensors and motors to make your projects light up, react to sounds, move, sense temperature, and all sorts of other tricks. You’ll build a project from scratch—maybe a puppet, robot, a spaceman helmet, or whatever else your creativity inspires. Along the way, you’ll have workshop facilities available to you as a temporary member of the Victoria Makerspace (makerspace.ca) and access to all of the instructional videos from one of the leading special effects studios, Stan Winston Studios, www.stanwinstonschool.com/tutorials.

At the end of this course, you will have the knowledge you need to embed a computer into all of your artistic creations.

Please note: this course will take place at Makerspace at the Vancouver Island Technology Park, 4A – 4476 Markham Street.

Course Includes: Arduino kits, 2 months MakerSpace Membership, 2 months Stan Winston access.