Miriam Langer
Jason Alderman
Arduino! Raspberry Pi! It's very likely that you've heard of these open source microcontrollers and minicomputers. You might even own them. Unfortunately, there’s a huge gulf between beginner “blink an LED” tutorials and advanced projects, with few useful things in between.
Our goal in this workshop is to introduce you to open source hardware (OSHW), and get you started by building two basic-but-practical projects you can use in your museum (a video player and an infrared visitor counter). We’ll let you choose one of them to expand upon with advanced lessons, and then discuss ways you can move beyond them to other projects with your newfound knowledge.
Participants should bring a laptop computer, and will be given software to install before the workshop. Hardware and tools will be provided for the duration of the workshop, and participants will be able to purchase a kit to take back with them to their museums. All code for the projects will be made available to participants.