Kitspace Newsletter #1: Assembling Projects
Hi,
Thanks for subscribing to the Kitspace Newsletter. This is our first ever: issue #1! Here are some updates of what's been going on with Kitspace:
Assembly guide for KiCad projects
Thanks to work by open source contributor Ian Ross we have integrated qu1ck's fantastic Interactive HTML BOM plugin into Kitspace. All KiCad projects will now have an interactive page which helps with DIY assembly. The page visualizes component placement and lets you check-off parts as you go.
Check out Matt Venn's Teensy Audio FX or Radiona's FPGA development board ULX3S as example KiCad projects. Ian Ross is now looking at extending the use of this plugin to other CAD programs such as EAGLE.
Search index of components
Abdulrhman Ghanem expanded the search index of Kitspace to include the bill of materials data. Now you can enter specific components to find example projects using that component. Try it out now by entering your favorite chip on kitspace.org, e.g "attiny85" or "ice40".
Analytics are now public
We have set up a public analytics page through Plausible. This is a fully free/libre/open source and privacy respecting analytics solution. The public page lets everyone take part and see the impact of their contributions to the Kitspace visitor numbers. It also lets you explore popular projects and see other interesting places on the web where Kitspace projects are being shared.
Popular Projects
Here are two of our most popular projects this month:
DIY Particle Detector
Oliver Keller's DIY-friendly educational project for measuring sub-atomic particles and radioactivity got a lot of attention by being highlighted through CERN on Twitter:
🛠 Did you ever want to make your own particle detector?
— CERN (@CERN) May 13, 2020
Here is your chance! Build this low-cost open hardware project, investigate natural radioactivity around you and become a true citizen scientist: https://t.co/IUWuZ1mQ74 pic.twitter.com/SFcfWp9jIq
This is one of the best documented project on Kitspace. The build instructions on the Github wiki are fantastic and Oliver is always happy to help. I recommend this project to anyone with an interest in radioactivity even if, or especially if, you have never soldered anything before.
The design comes in two variants, but both variants use the same printed circuit board, only the bill of materials and assembly varies. There's an alpha spectrometer but the electron detector is the easier to solder of the two:
electron-detector on Kitspace
Low-cost DIY particle detector for radioactivity: Electron-detector variant - Shared on Kitspace - Kitspace is a place to share ready to order electronics designs. You can order the right components for this project with a few clicks.
Open Book
The Open Book is a project by Joey Castillo. It's an e-paper reading device that is buildable by almost everyone. All the circuits that make it work, and hints for the assembly are on the board itself!
There are two versions: the ebook-wing, which is a little bit easier to solder since you can use the Adafruit Feather, which can be bought pre-assembled, and the main version which includes everything on the main printed circuit board.
https://kitspace.org/boards/github.com/joeycastillo/the-open-book/open-book/You can now buy the boards directly from Joey through the Oddly Specific Objects Tindie store.
That's all for this addition. Thanks for reading.
Cheers,
Kaspar