We had a great time this weekend at the w.a.v.e.s festival at the Detroit River. Friday and Saturday evening, the riverfront was lit up from Janette Ave to the Ambassador Bridge with displays, booths, art, food, and music. Hackforge had nonstop visitors to our booth which featured a hand-crank SpokePOV bike, our Makerbot 3D printer, and a cymatics rig. Our highly interactive booth was the source of lots of noise, questions, and discussion on the future of technology.
We also brought together electronic nerds and bike nerds with SpokePOVs. On Friday night, we stopped by Bike Friendly Windsor Essex‘s AGM at City Cyclery and attached the custom display LEDs to three bikes before their Night Lights Ride.
Big props to Chris Deschamps, Nik Steel, Paul Anderson, AmberJoy Kouvalis, Aaron Mavrinac, and Phil Aylesworth for helping out during the festival.
Click below for a Storified breakdown of the weekend!
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Hackforge attended Nerd Nite at Phog Lounge last Thursday, September 18th! We talked about the who, what, why of Hackforge and demonstrated SpokePOV and 3D printing! We also 3D printed this lil’ guy. Big thanks to AmberJoy Kouvalis for bringing her 3D printer for the night and Paul Anderson for helping with the demonstrations.
If you’d like to see 3D printing and SpokePovs for yourself, come check out Hackforge’s booth at this weekend’s w.a.v.e.s festival!
Saturday, September 20th, Hackforge got together to assemble SpokePOV kits for this weekend’s w.a.v.e.s. festival. The programmed LED lights will be attached to bicycle spokes and ridden around the festival on September 26th and 27th.
We had a dozen people come to the event, including a handful of beginners to soldering. Our Program Coordinator Sarah was on Team Newbie and learned to work on a circuit board. Big thanks to everyone who attended and to those who brought their soldering irons!
We’re excited to show off our hard work this weekend at w.a.v.e.s. Keep an eye out for us – we’ll be so bright, it will be hard to miss us!
Click below for more pictures! Thanks to Hannah Rose for the great shots of the afternoon.
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Undum is a set of Javascript libraries that make it easy to create your own “Choose your own Adventure” or “Fighting Fantasy” style piece of interactive fiction. It’s a great way to learn the basics of computer programming (and JavaScript) because there is almost no new code required to create a game. Doug Sartori will give a brief introduction to computer programming and JavaScript, then create a simple game, workshop style. Bring a laptop if you’d like to follow along and create your own!
This Tech Talk takes place on Thursday, October 2nd at 7PM at Hackforge (850 Ouellette Ave).
Nerd Level: Perfect for beginners.
Doug Sartori is a Hackforge board member and partner in the Southwestern Ontario software consultancy Parallel 42 Systems. He has been a software professional since 2000. He has worked as a consultant, developer, and product manager for companies large and small.
The Hackforge Software Guild is getting together more often! Going forward, we’ll be gathering every Wednesday evening in the Hackforge space. Every second week will continue as previously: you’ll pair up with a partner and solve a programming puzzle in various ways, improving your skills and workflow as a programmer. On the opposite weeks, however, we’re introducing Social Coding Night: bring your laptop, hang out with the Hackforge Software Guild and work on whatever programming project you’d like!
Social Coding Night starts tonight – Wednesday, September 17th – and continues every second Wednesday thereafter.
Social Coding Nights: 6-9PM September 17, October 1, 15, 29
Katas & Formal Discussion: 6-9PM September 24, October 8, 22