Planet Arduino

Before smartphones exploded on the scene in the late 00s, there was still a reasonable demand for pocket-sized computers that could do relatively simple computing tasks. Palm Pilots and other PDAs (Personal Digital Assistants) were all the rage in the ’90s and early ’00s, although for cutting-edge tech from that era plenty of these devices had astronomical price tags. This Arduino-based PDA hearkens back to that era, albeit with a much more accessible parts list.

The build is based around an Arudino Nano with an OLED screen and has the five necessary functions for a PDA: calculator, stopwatch, games, phonebook, and a calendar. With all of these components on such a small microcontroller, memory quickly became an issue when using the default libraries. [Danko] uses his own custom libraries in order to make the best use of memory which are all available on the project’s GitHub page. The build also includes a custom PCB to keep the entire pocket computer pocket-sized.

There are some other features packed into this tiny build as well, like the breakout game that can be played with a potentiometer. It’s an impressive build that makes as much use of the microcontroller’s capabilities as is possible, and if you enjoy projects where a microcontroller is used as if it is a PC take a look at this Arduino build with its own command-line interface.

Thursday May 28th at noon The Computer History Museum is hosting an open lecture by Massimo Banzi, co-founder of the Arduino project. He will cover the historical origins of Arduino, including discussion of the process of designing tools which make digital technology accessible to people who are not experts, and the essential role of the larger Arduino ecosystem that supports this remarkable computer platform.

The Computer History Museum, located in Mountain View (California), is a nonprofit organization  exploring the history of computing and its ongoing impact on society in the last 40 years. The Museum is dedicated to the preservation and celebration of computer history, it hosts the largest international collection of computing artifacts in the world and many virtual exhibition you can explore directly online.

If you like vintage images and history of computing, check the “visible storage” collection below.

The main image of this post is a picture by Massimo Banzi showing the first useable Arduino prototype. Still called “Wiring Lite”, used as a low cost module for wiring users. David Cuartielles joined at this point (the flying resistor is his first contribution to the design) from this point on the project becomes Arduino. 

by Juan J. Martínez:

This is my first serious attempt to learn electronics. DAN64 is my first project and it has been a discovery process during 3 months of my free time. I had to learn a lot of things I didn’t know much about, from basic electronics to the details of the AVRs -and specifically the ATmega328-, and a whole world of things in between such as signalling, protocols, interfaces, modulation and demodulation, SDKs, EDA software, prototyping, PCB fabrication, etc.

I’m certain that in this project I’m doing many stupid things and I’m sure my approach to solving some of the problems is not the best, but in my discharge I can only say: it works! (to some extent at least).

I got lots of gotcha! moments, ups and downs where I though I couldn’t finish the project because perhaps what I was trying to achieve was just impossible.

So this is not about perfection but about good enough for me and about the learning process and having fun.

DAN64 – an AVR based 8-bit microcomputer - [Link]