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Building a Sliding Tile Clock by Lewin Day
Monday March 31^st, 2025 at 5:01 PM

Hackaday

Hackers like making clocks, and we like reporting on them around these parts. Particularly if they’ve got a creative mechanism that we haven’t seen before. This fine timepiece from [gooikerjh] fits the bill precisely—it’s a sliding tile clock!

The brains of the build is an Arduino Nano ESP32. No, that’s not a typo. It’s basically an ESP32 in a Nano-like form factor. It relies on its in-built WiFi hardware to connect to the internet and synchronize itself with time servers so that it’s always showing accurate time. The ESP32 is set up to control a set of four stepper motors with a ULN2003 IC, and they run the neat time display mechanism.

All the custom parts are 3D printed, and the sliding tile concept is simple enough. There are four digits that show the time. Each digit contains number tiles that slide into place as the digit rotates. To increment the digit by one, it simply needs to be rotated 180 degrees by the relevant stepper motor, and the next number tile will slide into place.

We love a good clock at Hackaday—the more mechanical, the better. If you’re cooking up your own nifty and enigmatic clocks at home, don’t hesitate to drop us a line!

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jepler

3 days ago

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#9609: Rxser's Flash Guuzen nimo Saiaku na Nagano 〜Kouen hen〜 in 00:38.92
Monday March 31^st, 2025 at 4:50 PM

TASVideos Submissions

Happy April fools day! (Submission 1 of 3)

Introduction:

"Guuzen nimo Saiaku na Nagano 〜Kouen hen〜" is a Henry Stickman like game developed by "Europe-Studio.net" to the best of my knowledge.

Interesting Lore:

I was searching for more Flash games to put on my list for TASes. So I thought that Speedrun.com would be an amazing option for this. And then, I saw this. You and I are probably wondering right now, WTF is the context of this? Good question, because I can't answer that. The story goes is that you are peacefully consuming your beverage of choice when all of a sudden, a bully approches and now you have to perform self-defence to get away.

After that, once you manage to escape, the bullies find their next victim and the game ends. Yeah, don't ask me what I was on when I made this. The WR holder (the only runner) got a 1:22 which is funny due to the delay when the runner presses the next option. So, if you want a free WR, it's up for grabs. One last thing to note, there are multiple games like this because I went down the rabbit hole. :P

"WR" Run:

(Link to video)

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jepler

3 days ago

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April Fools submissions are starting on tasvideos

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New Windows Scheduled Task Will Launch Office Apps Faster
Thursday March 27^th, 2025 at 4:15 PM

Slashdot

Microsoft plans to roll out a new Windows scheduled task in May that launches automatically to help Microsoft Office apps load faster. From a report: The company says the "Startup Boost" task will launch in the background on logon, with the roll-out to start in mid-May and worldwide general availability to be reached by late May 2025. On systems where it's toggled on, users will see new Office Startup Boost and Office Startup Boost Logon tasks in the Windows Task Scheduler, which will ensure that Office apps can preload "performance enhancements."

"We are introducing a new Startup Boost task from the Microsoft Office installer to optimize performance and load-time of experiences within Office applications," Microsoft says on the Microsoft 365 message center. "After the system performs the task, the app remains in a paused state until the app launches and the sequence resumes, or the system removes the app from memory to reclaim resources. The system can perform this task for an app after a device reboot and periodically as system conditions allow."

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jepler

7 days ago

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Gawd remember the early 2000s when every ducking application did this? Keep this bad idea in the dustbin where it belongs

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Solar Power, Logically by Al Williams
Thursday March 20^th, 2025 at 10:52 PM

Hackaday

We’ve all seen the ads. Some offer “free” solar panels. Others promise nearly free energy if you just purchase a solar — well, solar system doesn’t sound right — maybe… solar energy setup. Many of these plans are dubious at best. You pay for someone to mount solar panels on your house and then pay them for the electricity they generate at — presumably — a lower cost than your usual source of electricity. But what about just doing your own set up? Is it worth it? We can’t answer that, but [Brian Potter] can help you answer it for yourself.

In a recent post, he talks about the rise of solar power and how it is becoming a large part of the power generation landscape. Interestingly, he presents graphs of things like the cost per watt of solar panels adjusted for 2023 dollars. In 1975, a watt cost over $100. These days it is about $0.30. So the price isn’t what slows solar adoption.

The biggest problem is the intermittent nature of solar. But how bad is that really? It depends. If you can sell power back to the grid when you have it to spare and then buy it back later, that might make sense. But it is more effective to store what you make for your own use.

That, however, complicates things. If you really want to go off the grid, you need enough capacity to address your peak demand and enough storage to meet demand over several days to account for overcast days, for example.

There’s more to it than just that. Read the post for more details. But even if you don’t want solar, if you enjoy seeing data-driven analysis, there is plenty to like here.

Building an effective solar power system is within reach of nearly anyone these days. Some of the problems with solar go away when you put the cells in orbit. Of course, that always raises new problems.

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jepler

13 days ago

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30 cents a watt? Why, some folks pay that per kWh. Solar almost can't NOT pay for itself at that price.

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pleppik

13 days ago

Yes, but…that’s just the cost of the panels. You need inverters, mounting, installation, etc., so the actual system cost is likely to be $2-$4/watt depending on where you live. The price of the panels has dropped tremendously over the past 20 years, but the price of everything else has not.

World’s Smallest Blinky, Now Even Smaller by Dan Maloney
Thursday March 20^th, 2025 at 9:37 PM

Hackaday

Here at Hackaday, it’s a pretty safe bet that putting “World’s smallest” in the title of an article will instantly attract comments claiming that someone else built a far smaller version of the same thing. But that’s OK, because if there’s something smaller than this nearly microscopic LED blinky build, we definitely want to know about it.

The reason behind [Mike Roller]’s build is simple: he wanted to build something smaller than the previous smallest blinky. The 3.2-mm x 2.5-mm footprint of that effort is a tough act to follow, but technology has advanced somewhat in the last seven years, and [Mike] took advantage of that by basing his design on an ATtiny20 microcontroller in a WLCSP package and an 0201 LED, along with a current-limiting resistor and a decoupling capacitor. Powering the project is a 220-μF tantalum capacitor, which at a relatively whopping 3.2 mm x 1.6 mm determines the size of the PCB, which [Mike] insisted on using.

Assembling the project was challenging, to say the least. [Mike] originally tried a laboratory hot plate to reflow the board, but when the magnetic stirrer played havoc with the parts, he switched to a hot-air rework station with a very low airflow. Programming the microcontroller almost seemed like it was more of a challenge; when the pogo pins he was planning to use proved too large for the job he tacked leads made from 38-gauge magnet wire to the board with the aid of a micro hot air tool.

After building version one, [Mike] realized that even smaller components were available, so there’s now a 2.4 mm x 1.5 mm version using an 01005 LED. We suspect there’ll be a version 3.0 soon, though — he mentions that the new TI ultra-small microcontrollers weren’t available yet when he pulled this off, and no doubt he’ll want to take a stab at this again.

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jepler

14 days ago

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comments on hackaday came to the same conclusion as me: what if you dead-bug the LED on the IC pads and dispense with the PCB altogether...

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ESDI Adventures (os2museum.com)
Thursday March 20^th, 2025 at 9:07 PM

Two Stop Bits

Comments

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jepler

14 days ago

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Remember ESDI? I had plumb fergot.

Earth, Sol system, Western spiral arm

Building a Sliding Tile Clock by Lewin Day Monday March 31st, 2025 at 5:01 PM

#9609: Rxser's Flash Guuzen nimo Saiaku na Nagano 〜Kouen hen〜 in 00:38.92 Monday March 31st, 2025 at 4:50 PM

Introduction:

Interesting Lore:

"WR" Run:

New Windows Scheduled Task Will Launch Office Apps Faster Thursday March 27th, 2025 at 4:15 PM

Solar Power, Logically by Al Williams Thursday March 20th, 2025 at 10:52 PM

World’s Smallest Blinky, Now Even Smaller by Dan Maloney Thursday March 20th, 2025 at 9:37 PM

ESDI Adventures (os2museum.com) Thursday March 20th, 2025 at 9:07 PM

Building a Sliding Tile Clock by Lewin Day
Monday March 31^st, 2025 at 5:01 PM

#9609: Rxser's Flash Guuzen nimo Saiaku na Nagano 〜Kouen hen〜 in 00:38.92
Monday March 31^st, 2025 at 4:50 PM

New Windows Scheduled Task Will Launch Office Apps Faster
Thursday March 27^th, 2025 at 4:15 PM

Solar Power, Logically by Al Williams
Thursday March 20^th, 2025 at 10:52 PM

World’s Smallest Blinky, Now Even Smaller by Dan Maloney
Thursday March 20^th, 2025 at 9:37 PM

ESDI Adventures (os2museum.com)
Thursday March 20^th, 2025 at 9:07 PM