Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Feb 4, 2012, 2:56 am
Since obtaining my amateur radio license 73 days ago, I've made it a point to do something to get my station established every single day. Even on the days when I took a short get-away vacation with my wife, I took a little time each day to look at Craig's List for HF rigs, and on our last evening w...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Feb 2, 2012, 3:49 am
Presently I'm converging on figuring out what my "big" antenna is going to be. After visiting Bill, W6WEM and seeing his 80m loop I think a skywire loop is how I'm going to go. Bill uses 450 ohm ladder line and a transmatch on his antenna. The area the antenna covers is less than I'd anticipated, 80...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Jan 24, 2012, 11:16 pm
Tonight I managed to successfully check into the 2m net for the Nevada County Amateur Radio Club. Originally I just intended to listen in and check in on the later 10m net. I figured I had a better chance of getting in to that, since VHF hasn't worked well for me previously. So I tried to monitor th...
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Mark G. posted an article on A Beginning Programmer's Guide to Java - Jan 23, 2012, 8:15 pm
Lion is the first version of Mac OS X that doesn't come with Java already installed. Earlier versions not only had the Java Virtual Machine or runtime element installed, but they also had the JDK installed, which is the part that lets you write your own Java programs. Once, Java was an important par...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Jan 18, 2012, 8:12 pm
A short while ago I got a telephone call from a nearby radio amateur named Bill, call sign W6WEM, to tell me that he had a radiogram to deliver to me. The message was from Pat, WB5NKD of Oklahoma City. I don't know Pat, but she sent me a nice message encouraging me to check out getting on the amateu...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Oct 21, 2011, 6:20 pm
I was recently contacted by Robert Grzesek, developer of MeshCAM, a 3D CAM program. He'd seen my earlier article where I express some frustration with "free" software, particularly for CAM. The free software I tried usually did simple rasterized cuts of the object loaded, with the result that a lot ...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Oct 21, 2011, 1:37 am
I've been using Google's free Sketchup program for some 3D object designs lately. I've been using it for a while, but I only use it off and on, so my expertise is growing slowly. Tonight I wanted to model something based on an Object of Rotation, which we all remember from math class is what you get...
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Mark G. posted an article on A Beginning Programmer's Guide to Java - Oct 20, 2011, 10:47 pm
One of the nice things about Java is that is supported on more than desktop platforms, and has been for a long time. This means there is not only a large library of existing software, but also well-tuned development systems to use with mobile platforms. By "mobile platform", I'm referring to smartph...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Oct 4, 2011, 12:24 am
In a prior post, I'd made a mistake handling the material when cutting a full 3D object using gcode files generated by Vectric's Cut3D CAM software. After that I tried again. That time things were going swimmingly until I got some gunk on a leadscrew that hung up the X axis and ruined the cut. Well,...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Sep 20, 2011, 5:10 pm
After running through a bunch of free CAM software that didn't do what I wanted, I finally ended up where I pretty well knew I was going to end up. I downloaded a trial version of Vectric's Cut3D software. I also happened to have some samples of machinable urethane plastics to try out, and the new s...
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Mark G. posted an article on A Beginning Programmer's Guide to Java - Sep 6, 2011, 12:00 am
Java 7 has added a new feature, binary literals for integer number types (byte, short, int, and long.) Before we can get excited about this, we need to know what that means. In earlier versions of Java, we have had several other types of literal value. Let's Get Literal What is a "literal"? A litera...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Sep 5, 2011, 3:06 am
I got an email message today about an image I posted some long time ago of a poster for the Motorola 68000 processor. The original image is a black and white test of image detail with my then-new cell phone. Well, looking back at that old image is downright embarrassing. So here's a better one,...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Aug 4, 2011, 12:27 am
Traveller is a science fiction RPG that appeared in 1977. Supplements and add-ons for this game appeared for another 6 years or so until a new version, MegaTraveller, appeared. Other versions have followed, with the most recent being Traveller from Mongoose Publishing. The original game (PDF of cont...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Jul 20, 2011, 4:48 pm
In the 1970s I regularly shopped at a local militaria/war game shop in Walnut Creek, CA called The Centurion. In 1977 they had a new game, called Traveller. When I bought it, the guy at the shop commented "I thought of you when I ordered this one. You're the first one to get it, let me know what you...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Jul 12, 2011, 7:26 pm
Here are some basic rules I use when selecting or setting up CNC projects. Let me know your rules, or any tweaks you see to mine. Thanks! 1. Don't make anything that you can buy easily, unless you have some specific reason that over-rides the extra cost, effort, and likely unforeseen problems. 2. Re...
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Mark G. posted an article on A Beginning Programmer's Guide to Java - Jun 24, 2011, 8:16 pm
One of those things that vexes beginning programmers is assigning values to a variable in Java. Part of what makes it so vexing is that the problem is practically invisible to an experienced programmer. Another part of it is that we use the equals sign (=) to do the assignment. Take a look at these ...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Jun 21, 2011, 12:26 am
Here's the initial results of my spoon rack projects as mentioned in prior posts: My Spoon Rack Project Idea Decorative Motifs for the Spoon Rack Here's the first one: I have parts for 3 cut out. There's a bit of manual finish work yet to do for the remaining ones. The weather has turned hot and dr...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Jun 7, 2011, 8:26 pm
My manual gcode workflow is getting better. Until I'm in a position to pick up some commercial CAM software (probably early fall later this year), I'm getting by with manual processes. It's not too bad, the fact is there's still a lot I'm learning about machining while I work. The lack of software d...
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Mark G. posted an article on A Beginning Programmer's Guide to Java - Jun 7, 2011, 4:16 pm
The basics of math in Java using operators was covered in Part 1: Operators. There I went over the standard operations built into the language itself, rather than in its APIs (libraries). But that's hardly the end of useful math operations. Especially when doing graphics, where all those geometric a...
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Mark G. posted an article on A Beginning Programmer's Guide to Java - May 27, 2011, 5:31 pm
One of the most valuable uses of a computer is...computing. That is, acting as a mathematical calculator. Java has a plethora of tools for doing computation. Operators The standard math functions that are built into the Java language are called operators. These are the sort of math functions you wou...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - May 26, 2011, 8:46 pm
I posted my design for mounting the inexpensive Harbor Freight 1/4" trim router #44914 to a CNC on my website today. I've posted a dimensional drawing of the base plate, and given instructions for the rest (it's bone-simple, really!) Click the pic below to go right to it:
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - May 24, 2011, 11:21 pm
We collect souvenir spoons when we travel. Unfortunately, we overflowed the little wooden rack that holds our spoons several years ago: We have almost twice as many little spoons as will fit on the rack. So I decided that a good CNC project would be making some additional racks that will hold the a...
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Mark G. posted an article on A Beginning Programmer's Guide to Java - May 20, 2011, 4:49 pm
To use Java effectively, you want to create and use your own classes. This is one of the great powers of object-oriented languages--the ability to construct programs out of independent building-blocks that cut large problems down into small, easily solvable ones. There's a lot more that can be said,...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - May 20, 2011, 4:35 pm
I've posted step by step instructions of how I assembled my microCarve A4 CNC router on my website: microCarve A4 Assembly This is the first component of a new section of my site dedicated to CNC machining. Since I've gotten the A4, I've really enjoyed spending a lot of time working with it, learnin...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - May 16, 2011, 6:01 pm
This last weekend, my daughters went to a special SacAnime Con. It was a Japan Disaster Relief con, which raised $6556. My daughters had some space on a vendor table at the con, and last week they asked me of I could make something that they could sell to raise money for disaster relief. I set aside...
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Mark G. posted an article on A Beginning Programmer's Guide to Java - May 13, 2011, 2:35 pm
One of the most common types of data file is a CSV (Comma Separated Value) file. They can be exported by many popular applications, notable spreadsheet programs like Excel and Numbers. They are easy to read into your Java programs once you know how. Reading the file is as simple as reading a text fi...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - May 6, 2011, 8:10 pm
I'm in the second day of a one day project today. Hopefully I'll finish it on Day 3. But, at each step I'm learning new and useful things. Yesterday I learned: There's a point where you need to stop writing gcode by hand, and use CAD/CAM. Doing tool compensation by hand is a real bear. Don't think o...
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Mark G. posted an article on A Beginning Programmer's Guide to Java - May 6, 2011, 3:58 pm
We've looked at saving and loading objects to files. If we need to exchange information for use by a different program than our own it will seldom be convenient to save objects. Text files are commonly used to do this. Text files are even simpler to deal with than Object files, thanks to classes in ...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - May 4, 2011, 8:39 pm
I decided to try doing a smaller, more precise job with my microCarve A4 CNC today. I took some of my GCode program from yesterday, scaled it down (fortunately I provided variables to do all that automatically for me) and added a chip number in characters that I hoped would show with the bit I'm usi...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - May 4, 2011, 12:47 pm
I'm spending a lot of time with my new microCarve A4 CNC router this week. My first couple of items were made using a handy image to gcode converter that's built into the EMC2 control software I'm using. But the image converter simply treats the image as a depth map which is cut by raster-scanning w...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - May 2, 2011, 4:23 pm
I got a router mounted on my microCarve A4 CNC machine this weekend. The router I'm using is an inexpensive 1/4" router from Harbor Freight. It's mounted on a base plate I made out of 3/4" plywood with a pair of muffler clamps holding the body of the router: I've got two bands wrapped around the bo...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Apr 22, 2011, 9:12 am
I put up a downloadable PDF of my own 8085 reference card on my website: 8085 Microprocessor Reference Card I've added a bunch of information that I often use that's not on the original Intel reference card. This includes the undocumented 8085 instructions, timing for all instructions in T-States, a...
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Mark G. posted an article on A Beginning Programmer's Guide to Java - Apr 14, 2011, 3:51 pm
Jump to Reading Data from Files with Java>> Saving Data to Files with Java Saving objects to a file in Java has a few steps to it, but it's pretty easy. We open a file to write to, create a "stream" for putting objects into the file, write the objects to that stream to put them in the file, then clo...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Apr 9, 2011, 2:53 am
I finished my motor controller box day before yesterday, as described in Gecko G540 Power Up! as I build my microCarve A4 CNC router. Just take a look at the past several articles in my archive for more background and pictures of the A4. Completed Controller Box with Improved Fan Cutouts Front with ...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Apr 5, 2011, 12:59 am
I finished the enclosure for the power supply and Gecko motor controller today! I changed my fan layout a bit. I put all four fans to work at the back of the box. Two are intake fans, the ones on the opposite side are outlet fans. They blow across the back of the Gecko. They make a pretty good strea...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Apr 4, 2011, 2:03 am
I'm getting closer to having a working CNC mill. I've been taking long as necessary to get the job done right the first time as much as possible, and to put on some polish at the outset. My current work is to convert an old UPS into the power supply and motor driver enclosure for my CNC mill. I star...
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Mark G. posted an article on Cat Yarns - Apr 2, 2011, 3:58 am
Menelaus, our star cat and my shoe thief, nicknamed "poof-poof" because his fur was so puffy, left us today (April 1, 2011.) He was about 17 years old. He adopted us, the only cat we've been adopted by. He showed up on our back porch, determined to make us his family. We already had 3 cats, and rea...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Apr 1, 2011, 4:09 pm
I'm the proud new owner of a microCarve A4 CNC machine. I'm still getting it built up--I got my motors and motor driver three days ago and the A4 just arrived yesterday. Yesterday and today I was working on an enclosure for my Gecko G540 driver and the power supply for it and the motors. After looki...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Mar 29, 2011, 9:48 pm
My Microcarve A4 CNC is on its way! John shipped it this morning. Here's what it looks like: Over-all view X Axis Motor Mount at Left Y Axis Motor Mount in Foreground Z-Axis. Beautiful, isn't it? Its Unpainted Twin. A bit more detail visible. Logo shows nicely here. I'm getting ready for its arriva...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Mar 28, 2011, 3:58 am
I've been looking at setting up my own CNC machine for about ten years now. I've worked with CNC and CMM machines off and on since the early 80s. I remember hooking up a CP/M computer to a CMM machine, wowing the lab with its ability to automatically record measurements then produce a compliance rep...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Mar 20, 2011, 9:01 pm
My spring break project this week has been redoing the padding on my easy chair. I've got a great big La-Z-Boy that I bought about 10 years ago. The padding on the seat and the lower back needed to be refreshed and the time off from teaching this week gave me a chance to do it. This Time, I'll Do It...
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Mark G. posted an article on A Beginning Programmer's Guide to Java - Mar 20, 2011, 7:22 pm
Today I'm going to start cleaning out the references in old posts to Sun Microsystems. Sun is gone now, except for a page that tells you it's gone and points toward Oracle. Oracle bought Sun, and now owns Java. Many of my old articles point toward the previous Sun website. I'll be changing those to ...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Mar 2, 2011, 1:07 am
Model Railroading is a hobby that's been at the edges of my life for a long time. And now it's entered from a new direction. But first to recap: Round 1 When I was a kid I got interested in model railroading early on. As it was, I loved trains, and I lived in a train town. Even at 3, I was drawing m...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Feb 16, 2011, 6:50 pm
I wrote a post about the HFE Electronics Store last year. They took over the former HSC Electronics store here in the Sacramento area. I drove by today, and the store was empty. HFE Electronics. A Valiant Effort, but Now It's Gone. It looks like they went out of business two or three months ago, bas...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Feb 14, 2011, 12:35 pm
TCG Yavuz in 1:1800 Among the various games I enjoy are naval miniatures games. When Axis and Allies: War at Sea came out a few years ago, I liked the fact that there was an easy source of new naval miniatures (and a decent set of rules). But the minis were in yet another new scale. Traditional mini...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Feb 8, 2011, 12:55 am
I've posted some of the coding forms I use on my website. For me, hand coding and hand assembling software is pleasant and relaxing. It's like crochet or embroidery (I do both of those as well as programming.) Something as simple as a printed form makes it nicer, neater, and faster. The forms of my ...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Feb 5, 2011, 1:00 am
With the hardware work on my 8085 microprocessor trainer project about 99% complete, most of my effort over the past month or so has been developing a simple monitor program (a sort of mini-OS) for it. The biggest part of that OS deals with the user interface (go figure), specifically the routines f...
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Mark G. posted an article on An Infinite Number of Cats on Keyboards - Jan 25, 2011, 5:37 pm
I'm gratified by the response my recent article Should I Still Learn Java? has received, especially at sites like Hacker News and DZone. Among the comments at HN were some folks who felt that Java is a poor choice of language for beginning programmers. There were a number of reasons given, many of t...
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Mark G. posted an article on A Beginning Programmer's Guide to Java - Jan 25, 2011, 2:52 pm
Java is picky about the file names you use. Each source file can contain one public class. The source file's name has to be the name of that class. By convention, the source file uses a .java filename extension (a tail end of a file name that marks the file as being of a particular type of file.) So...
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Mark G. posted an article on A Beginning Programmer's Guide to Java - Jan 5, 2011, 2:13 am
With all the controversy surrounding Java thanks to the purchase of Sun by Oracle, the lawsuits flying back and forth over the Java Community Process, the Apache Foundation, Android, and all the rest, does it still make sense to learn Java? After all, the demise and abandonment of Java is being pred...
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