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The new WiMo Blog (WiMo's Garage) is here. Below are the last 5 entries.  Click the title of an entry in order to add to the discussion via a comment.

OOPics on sale
Posted Thu, 08 May 2008 18:28:14 GMT

I just got word that for one week only OOPics are on sale for $49... this is fairly decent as the OOPic-R's are usually about $80... I think/hope that this comes with the new firmware as well which has a few new objects to play with. 

Just thought that if you were thinking of creating a WiMo or like project, that you'd want to know! :)

http://www.oopic.com

-- Brian

I know I haven't posted too much lately, but I'm still here and am enjoying the emails that I get from people who are still playing around with WiMo and building variants.  I have some photos of one to post and will do that when I get a chance.  I'm also hoping to release a software update (not sure exactly when yet). 

But just wanted to get the word out that if you visit the WiMobot site this weekend, it may be down for system maintenance (or at least that is what I have been told).

You know how free time goes, but I'm looking forward to more frequent posts and some updates on WiMo and a couple related projects that I hope to work on soon. 

More soon!

   Brian

Yesterday, Lego celebrated its 50th Anniversary and C|Net published an article with some cool photos of Lego past and present.  It was neat to see a photo of WiMo in the article.  Happy anniversary Lego!

More soon!

-- Brian

So, it looks like WiMo has a sibling out there, or at least a distant cousin.  Olivier Bloch, an Embedded Developer that I met at MEDC, decided to show another way on how easy it is to use your Windows Mobile device to remotely control a robot.  Similar to the early versions of WiMo, you can use your device to drive the robot.  What is cool is that he mainly used Microsoft Robotics Studio's VPL to create the entire thing. 

I'll be taking some time off from work this December, and I'm looking forward to dabbling around with WiMo again.  I'm hoping to finish some of the projects I started (WiMonet, MSRS 1.5).  I even have another WiMo project in mind.  But if you can't wait until then to get started on MSRS 1.5 and VPL... definitely go check out Olivier's stuff. 

-- Brian

I'm back to working on WiMo after a longer than expected break (Summer, my day job, and other random stuff that came up).  I still owe you all the WiMonet How-To and I'm long over do for a code update.  I hope to have some new stuff posted soon.  I even have a new WiMo project/modification I'm going to be working on soon. 

In a few of my WiMo designs (WiMo Aggressor, WiMonet, Monster WiMo and a few other prototypes) i have used the OOPic as the microcontroller.  The only real problem with this microcontroller is that the compiler for it does not work on Vista.  So, when it came time to modify OOPic code, i just used a spare XP machine.  Not necessarily ideal.  Especially when I want to work on WiMo away from the office or home, just on my laptop (which I run Vista on).

I do believe that Savage Innovations is working on getting the compiler to work on Vista, but until then, here's one way you can get by using Vista.  I just set this up tonight and so far it is working fairly nicely.  A little slower, but it sure beats having to dual boot my machine or working on two separate machines.

Basically, you run Windows XP in Virtual PC (VPC).  In case you didn't know, Virtual PC 2007 is a free download from Microsoft.  It's a neat application that allows you to host other Operating Systems within a Virtual Environment. 

If you have a copy of XP, you can install XP onto the Virtual PC.  Then you can install the OOPic compiler on the VPC and code away.  How about downloading your code to the OOPic?  Well, all you have to do is map the VPC's COM port (i used COM2) to the COM port you have the OOPic hooked up to on your physical machine.  VPC will pass all of the serial traffic from the OOPic to XP and vice versa.

Here are the settings that I used when I created the Virtual PC to which i installed XP:

Harddrive: 20 Gig max, just incase
Memory: 355MB
COM2: Physical COM3

All the rest of the settings are based more on your preference.  The really cool part is that I am actually using Bluetooth to hook the laptop up to the OOPic.  Via the Vista Bluetooth device settings, i added a partnership with the Sparkfun BlueSmirf i hooked up to the OOPic (see WiMo How-To on how to hook the BlueSmirft to the OOPic).  Use the passkey "default" with no quotes when Vista asks you for a passkey otherwise you'll never get a connection (you don't need this passkey when connecting via the Smartphone).  Take note of the Outgoing port (mine was COM3, hence the setting above) that is assigned. Then boot up your VPC XP and presto! You should be able to launch the OOPic software, setup the cable configuration to COM2 (assuming you used my settings) and be able to talk to the OOPic.

If you ever turn off the OOPic, you'll need to restart the VPC XP (at least that is what I have notice so far).

I hope this helps some of you out.  You do need a copy of XP for this to work. I just a copy of XP from a machine I wasn't using anymore (like the machine i used to use for the OOPic :)   ). 

Back to some WiMo work.  Hope to have something new posted for everyone soon.  :)

-- Brian