Open Source Bridge

PSAS is a student aerospace engineering project at Portland State University. We're building ultra-low-cost, open hardware and open source rockets that feature perhaps the most sophisticated amateur rocket avionics systems out there today.

Lots of attention has been given to GPUs for speeding up certain types of computations. While GPUs are very well suited for vector operations, there are other things they are not so well suited for. FPGAs (Field Programmable Gate Arrays) are not used as widely yet, but they offer a much more flexible computing fabric than GPUs. You can implement a GPU in an FPGA, for example, or you could implement your own custom processor optimized for very specialized tasks. The barrier to entry can be high for FPGAs: how does a person with a software development background get started using them? And what about HDLs (Hardware Description Langauges) used to program FPGAs? What's the difference between simulation and synthesis? What kinds of tools are freely available? These are some of the questions that will be addressed in this session.

Agile processes can be very successful for both clients and developers, but the rapid pace and the lack of detailed long-term plans can make it difficult to design and build high quality user experiences. We'll talk about good ways to do that.

The problem: My HVAC system is not balanced. Easy but boring solution: Hire a qualified contractor to fix it. More interesting solution: Use knowledge from dusty undergrad degree in electronics to cobble together some simple wireless temperature sensors using XBee modules and distribute them around the house. Then use Java programming knowledge to build up a monitoring system using open source software. Attempt to use readings from temperature sensors to figure out what's going on and fix it. This presentation will delve into the hardware and software aspects of the system, although with more emphasis on the software and the role that packages such as Apache Felix and Apache Mina play in the system.

Cassandra is an open source, highly scalable distributed database that brings together Dynamo's fully distributed design and Bigtable's ColumnFamily-based data model. In this talk we'll discuss the strategies Cassandra employs to provide an eventually consistent data model.

"This compression algorithm is of course very inefficient, at least when applied to a small collection of documents. But if you were to apply it to a larger collection, say, all the music ever recorded and all movies ever made, some gains may be realized...

API design, parallelism, automated testing, parallel automated testing, deployment, build tools, meta programming, GUI design and construction, hardware interfaces, network protocols, databases, change tracking, file formats, and why simple software becomes an epic journey.

Thomas Jefferson envisioned a nation of self-sufficient citizen farmers; programmers like Alan Kay and Bill Atkinson tried to help us code as easily as we might hang a poster on the wall. What happened to the HyperCard ideal? Have we settled for consumption over creation? I will explore the question through a case study, surveying the state of citizen programming in 2010 — from CouchApps to Shoes to plain-jane HTML5+JS to HyperCard 2.4 — and try to convince all comers that realizing the dream of the citizen coder is vital to continuing the ideals of open source.

I've been looking for an affordable, flexible, easy to learn robotics platform for years that I could use to teach kids the basics of programming/electronics/robotics. Last Fall, I finally found it.

Multicore computers are here: is your programming language ready?

Ever wanted to create your own printed circuit board? There are open source tools for that. This session will take you step-by-step through the process of creating a printed circuit board using the gEDA suite of electronic design automation tools. Beginners are welcome, no previous hardware experience required.

"Do you watch television? Is your furnace loud? Do you have $2?" My 7-year-old's marketing suggestions aside, building custom gadgets to improve your life is remarkably simple, and I'll prove it by building something on stage that you can duplicate at home.

What you need to know before you even think about raising venture or angel capital, presented by a Silicon Valley founder who raised $9m from top tier firms.

Co-conspirators Jamey Sharp and Josh Triplett get up to a lot of miscellaneous hacking mischief together. Much of this hacking occurs while staring at the same screen, and tag-teaming the keyboard. Sometimes this happens with the two of them in different places. We'll demo our favorite tools and invite audience contributions to the discussion.

Since 2001, Perl 5 has undergone a renaissance. Modern Perl programs are powerful, maintainable, and understandable. Come learn how to take advantage of perl circa 2010.

Markus: Nautilus? I thought you said noodle house! Matt: Wait, wait, I think I see her head!! Markus: Are you sure? Matt: Maybe It's Not Her Head...

Using your computer on a public network is like having a conversation on a city bus: people you don't know can hear everything you say. They'll probably be polite and ignore you, but you still might not want to shout out your credit card number. Yet this is what your computer does. All the time. And you don't know it.

Maybe the edge isn’t as close as we thought it was. Maybe you can do some really funky things with your language without accidentally summoning eldritch spirits. Or maybe not. The only way to find out is to try it—or, if you are of the more prudent proclivities, to watch someone else try it.