[HN Gopher] Show HN: I was reintroduced to computers: Raspberry Pi
___________________________________________________________________
Show HN: I was reintroduced to computers: Raspberry Pi
Author : observer2022
Score : 78 points
Date : 2025-12-02 09:14 UTC (3 days ago)
(HTM) web link (airoboticist.blog)
(TXT) w3m dump (airoboticist.blog)
| youchen_ wrote:
| What a wonderful journey back to computing! The Raspberry Pi is
| such a perfect platform for rekindling that curiosity and hands-
| on exploration. There's something special about being able to
| physically tinker with hardware while learning programming. Your
| excitement really comes through in this post!
| observer2022 wrote:
| Thank you
| Peteragain wrote:
| ..and for his next trick, adding a servo is easy. Pigpio provides
| services underneath the operating system including square wave
| generators. Power the servo at 7.2 volts and drive the signal
| directly off a gpio pin at 5 volts!
| sitzkrieg wrote:
| using an entire computer to generate a PWM, hooray!
| observer2022 wrote:
| Great idea, blog post #2 will definitely be about this.
| GardenLetter27 wrote:
| I've built something like this using the ESP32-CAM if you want
| lower power usage. Although the real power usage is in the motors
| anyway.
|
| It's awesome when it finally works and you can drive it around at
| a distance though!
| JKCalhoun wrote:
| Yeah, Arduino, Teensy, ESP32... I prefer these options when you
| _don 't_ in fact need an OS.
|
| Less OS means less to go wrong. (Just waiting for a Pi to boot
| vs. a Teensy is reason enough to go with the more stripped-down
| hardware.)
| observer2022 wrote:
| I agree, it definitely felt a bit spoiled using a full
| computer for a toy like this, but the main goal for me was
| learning something new.
| JKCalhoun wrote:
| No, that's cool. I didn't mean to come across as critical.
| d--b wrote:
| I have one of these:
|
| https://www.awymachinery.com/lawn-mower/remote-control-lawn-...
|
| Bad ideas are running through my brain right now.
| mywacaday wrote:
| How much does one of them go for?
| d--b wrote:
| You can get them for about 2000 euros in Europe. Variation in
| prices are mostly due to shipping from China.
| lioeters wrote:
| The picture of a little car kit loaded with a breadboard, a
| mountain of wires, and an added camera in the front was
| delightful. Now that's the hacker spirit! Thanks for the article,
| it's a joy to read.
| observer2022 wrote:
| Thank you for the kind words, glad you liked it!
| robviren wrote:
| Love to see the Pi getting some rather creative use! The most use
| I got out of one was as a health check endpoint for power in my
| garage which was holding frozen milk for my newborn, but the
| circuit kept tripping. Had another server email me if it couldn't
| reach the Pi for some reason. Just used some real simple Go code.
| It was not production but it worked. Not everything needs to
| change the world, maybe just make your day easier.
| observer2022 wrote:
| Exactly. When it helps your daily life, the whole build process
| is way more exciting. I really liked your project as well.
| raaron773 wrote:
| This is car is so cute. I love it!
| observer2022 wrote:
| thank you!
| yumenoandy wrote:
| > There may be a better way but it's a simple way to expose a
| camera feed without requiring heavy libraries.
|
| is ffmpeg considered heavy? can pipe rpicam into ffmpeg to get an
| SRT stream
| teeray wrote:
| > Did we feed the cat?
|
| > Is the cat okay?
|
| The cat is going to love this new toy
| observer2022 wrote:
| it's a love-hate relationship for now.
| lancekey wrote:
| great article and I'm a fan of the chat style about section.
| kudos!
| observer2022 wrote:
| Thank you for your kind words! I don't come from a particularly
| special background, so I tried to create something interesting
| and eye-catching to stand out.
| alnwlsn wrote:
| I think everyone builds one of these little camera cars at least
| once.
|
| I made one when I got my NTC CHIP[0] in 2015. This was a pretty
| big deal at the time because Raspberry Pi were still months away
| from releasing a model with integrated WiFi, and were sold out
| for quite a while after that. You had to use USB WiFi adapters,
| and this was always a little flakey.
|
| I attached my camera to a servo so you could tilt it up and down,
| and it even had a rear facing camera and a magnetic connector, so
| you could back up and 'dock' with a power supply to recharge. I
| wanted to make a little claw arm for it, but I never got that
| far. Good times, makes me want to do another one.
|
| 0 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CHIP_(computer)
| observer2022 wrote:
| An automatic charging dock and a robotic arm could be my next
| challenge. Really cool build
| yrotslluf wrote:
| Thinking through the stated use case makes me think a small drone
| that would undock, scan your house, send you the video, and
| redock on request would be a useful project/product. Great peace
| of mind without a full stationary security camera system.
| observer2022 wrote:
| Yeah that's about as mobile as a camera can get. I'd try it if
| it didn't scare the cat.
| sowbug wrote:
| https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/24/technology/amazon-ring-dr...
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2025-12-05 23:02 UTC)