Hackerspaces are fueled by caffeine. And while there are many ways to get your fix, coffee is king. It is the perfect beverage for a hacker because there are so many different ways to make it and so many different gadgets out there with which to make it.

Join us this Friday, May 18th, as HackPittsburgh member Scott presents a talk exploring some of the many methods of making and enjoying coffee. The talk will cover a variety of  techniques, and demonstrations will be given on how to use a Chemex, French press, aeropress, mokapot, and a vac pot (aka siphon brewer). Once the talk is over, you are welcome to stick around and try your hand at some of the various techniques so that you can taste and compare the different results.

Once the coffee making is concluded and everyone is nice and wired, HackPittsburgh will be firing up Artemis, the Starship simulator, for a few missions of space-based domination and conquest.

Free & open to the public.
Doors open at 7pm, event starts shortly thereafter.
We’re at 1936 Fifth Avenue, in the garage around back (on Watson).
Look for our flag over the door.

Image By Cindy Davis from Mountain Home, AR, USA [CC-BY-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

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Join us this Friday, May 11^th for a demonstration and presentation of the advanced line following robot, Johnny 0.5.  Johnny is designed to compete in the challenging CMU Mobot race, where rough pavement, bright sunlight, and uneven terrain make for some unique and very real world robotics challenges.

The presentation will include an overview of the project, focusing on the design process and general experience of designing and building the robot. The presentation will also give a high level overview of the technical aspects of the design, focusing primarily on the line sensor system.

For the sake of time and the fact that we will have a mix of experience levels present, the presentation won’t go into any details of the code.  Feel free however, to stick around after to presentation to discuss any specific aspect of the project in as much detail as you are interested in.

Free & open to the public.
Doors open at 7pm, event starts shortly thereafter.
We’re at 1936 Fifth Avenue, in the garage around back (on Watson).
Look for our flag over the door.

Photo: Nicole Hamilton, http://thetartan.org/2011/4/18/pillbox/mobots April 18, 2011

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Have you ever wanted to turn real life things into 3D virtual objects using commercial off-the-shelf hardware? Come to HackPGH this Friday at 7:00PM to find out how to use the world’s first consumer 3D depth camera – the Xbox Kinect – to digitize the world around you. Live demos will be shown, but you can also bring your own computer and Kinect to get started with the world of 3D scanning.

Check out the image in this post for an example of what you can do. 2D pics of 3d objects aren’t quite as cool because you can’t rotate them around, but you’ll just have to come to the talk to get the third dimension!

Free & open to the public.
Doors open at 7pm, event starts shortly thereafter.
We’re at 1936 Fifth Avenue, in the garage around back (on Watson).
Look for our flag over the door.

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Join us this Friday, April 27th, at the New Hazlett Theatre for the CMU School of Art’s Cyborg Cabaret!
(This is a field trip, the shop will not be open to the public as we’ll be at this event!)

ABOUT

The Cyborg Cabaret explores human, robot, & cyborg relationships in a variety show format featuring everything from cutting edge metal machines to cardboard-suited meat bags. Expect tear-jerking vignettes, frequent non-sequiters, and lots of humor through avant art-meets-science theater.

Our inaugural show will be at the New Hazlett Theater in Pittsburgh, PA on Friday, April 27, 2012! Pre-sale tickets are $8 for students, $12 general admission and $15 VIP. The VIP ticketholders will sit at cabaret tables at the front of the theater, with all other ticketholders in stadium seating.

RESERVE TICKETS

Prepare your power plugs! Get your tickets here.

VENUE DETAILS

Doors 7.00pm

Show starts at 8.00pm

PEOPLE

A first of its kind, this interdisciplinary show features talents from CMU’s Robotics Institute, School of Art and the larger Pittsburgh community. We live in a world of technological artifacts and connectivity, already romantic partners; interdependent, disruptive and enabling. Our Cyborg Cabaret explores this relationship at its source by leveraging collaborations between the arts, robotic and technological fields.

Contributors include: Heather Knight (co-director), Dan Wilcox (co-director), Julia Cahill, Riley Harmon, Professor Golan Levin, North Star, Professor Manuela Veloso and JD Whitewolf.

Sponsors: CMU School of Art, Assemble, VIA, HackPittsburgh (That’s us!), New Hazlett Theater

Full details at http://cyborgcabaret.org/

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This Friday April 20th, HackPittsburgh will be hosting a free & open-to-the-public talk by member Luc B. on the technology and history that went into the first telephones.

We’ll play with the different kinds of transmitters & receivers used in early phones, learn how they work, how to build them, and who got sued over their patents.

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Join us this Friday (4/13) for a free and open to the public Egg-Bot’ing by member Matt B:

We’ll have an Egg-Bot drawing robot (or two) from Evil Mad Scientist Labs on hand, and Matt’s going to bring some hard boiled eggs. We also have some dye on hand if you want to try your hand at multi-media decorating! Matt will have some images already ready to go, but if you have anything in SVG format that you’d like to try, please bring those files along (or dropbox them) and we’ll see if we can get those to work too!

Free and open to the public.
Doors open at 7pm, event starts shortly thereafter. As installs can take some time, please show up earlier rather than later. There will be no formal talk portion, so you can start shortly after arriving.
We’re at 1936 Fifth Avenue, in the garage around back (on Watson).
Look for our flag over the door.

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For this week’s Friday Night event, we are taking a field trip! Instead of being at the shop, HackPittsburgh will be showing off some of our projects at the TeeRex Studio at 5440 Penn Ave from 6 – 9pm on Friday during the Unblurred: First Fridays on Penn studio crawl. The shop will be closed, so this is the perfect opportunity to come check us out, as well as to check out the Unblurred events and activities. This month’s Unblurred also happens to coincide with, and is a part of, the Geek Arts/Green Innovators (GA/GI) festival, a celebration of the creative spirit that binds the eco, art and technology industries.

What is Unblurred? From their website: Various galleries in the Penn Avenue Arts District (4800-5500 Penn Avenue) will open their doors and showcase a variety of artwork and performances. Guests will experience new art and meet the most eclectic array of art makers, old and young, modern and classical, famous and amateur, emerging and veteran, all within walking distance of each other.

In other words, this Friday is the ideal chance to explore some of the artists, makers, and studios that Pittsburgh’s Penn Ave Arts District has to offer. While you are out there, be sure to stop by TeeRex studios and say hello to HackPittsburgh!

About the event at TeeRex Studios:
http://pittsburghpressreleases.com/2012/03/teerex-and-the-cotton-factory-open-for-gagi-festival-and-unblurred/

About Unblurred:
http://friendship-pgh.org/paai/unblurred/
https://www.facebook.com/events/405089156174274/

About GA/GI:
http://gagifest12.blogspot.com

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Have you ever wanted to be part of a spaceship crew? Here’s your chance! This Friday at HackPittsburgh, we will be playing Artemis, the Spaceship Bridge Simulator. From the website (http://www.artemis.eochu.com/):

Artemis is a multiplayer, multi-computer networked game for Windows computers.

Artemis simulates a spaceship bridge by networking several computers together. One computer runs the simulation and the “main screen”, while the others serve as workstations for the normal jobs a bridge officer might do, like Helm, Communication, Engineering, and Weapon Control.

Artemis is a social game where several players are together in one room (“bridge”) , and while they all work together, one player plays the Captain, a person who sits in the middle, doesn’t have a workstation, and tells everyone what to do.

If you have a laptop that you can use to run the game, please bring it (however it is not required!). The best way to tell if you can run the game is to download the demo from the website and run it. If it works, great! If not, then don’t worry, we will try to have extra workstations available. We can only run 6 people at a time, but we will try to make sure that everyone gets a chance to play (depending on how long each game lasts).

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Got a project that just needs a bit more attention before you can officially declare it finished? Could you use some inspiration to just Get It Done? Then Finish It Friday is for you! Bring your projects and start finishing things at 7pm.  If you don’t have something to finish up, maybe this is a great time to start that new project you’ve been thinking about! What better way to spend a friday night than to come commune with your fellow geeks while doing awesome things?

The details:

WHAT: Finish It Friday
WHERE: HackPittsburgh, 1936 5th. Ave.
WHEN: Mar 23, 7pm
MINISTERS OF DONE: Us!

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Interested in enhancing your clothing with electronics? In this introductory class, learn to create soft circuits by sewing with conductive thread. Students will create a light-up cuff bracelet from industrial felt, battery, and LEDs.

No previous experience with sewing, electronics, computing, or soldering is needed.



Participants with favorite sewing scissors and needlenose/beading pliers should bring them, however we will have enough to share.

All materials will be provided. This class is open to the public.

Buy tickets now at EventBrite.  The last day to buy tickets is Friday, Apr 13th!
See the ticket link for additional details.

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