screw you bbc!

hmm...

yeah, bbc, that's very nice. YOU CAN'T WEAR IT THOUGH.

look at his smug face makes me want to punch him gajkng;uoavbjrklea...

more patterny ideas

mmm... LED tetris. thinking of using this to show geeking out / gaming.


trying to make something resembling thought bubbles to represent bored.

i'm still trying to come up with the words that i am going to use... need to trawl through some twitter feeds methinks.

project related rant.

I've been looking around various processing and arduino sites, trying to find a piece of work that is similar to my idea, and i'm not really finding it anywhere. It seems people are more interested in getting data or information from the real world into the virtual, instead of the other way round.

There are several reasons why i chose to do this project this way, and make myself this brief. One is that technology is constantly becoming more and more personal, with mobile phones and ever smaller laptops. I don't think the internet is going to stay on screen forever, i think there are alternative ways of displaying the information and i think it's going to try to integrate more into the real world.

The reason i chose twitter for this project as the website to bring into the real world and display in an alternative way is because it's a tool that quite a lot of people use. It's a tool that people use to communicate with each other and also with themselves:



This data that people update whenever they feel like expresses how they are feeling in that moment in time, or just what they're up to. But it just sits on a web page, or in their widget, or in a feed somewhere in the internet. this information that expresses their thoughts isn't being expressed in a very expressive way (too many expressives, i know).

The reason that i'm choosing to display this information in patterns is because i'm trying to get it away from a screen, i don't want to recreate a standard display. i want it to be visual as that's personally my favourite sense, and i want there to be a level of secrecy in what each pattern means as there is a level of deciphering that needs to be done in twitter, with all the leet speek and emoticons.

I admit that i do need to work on what words the program is looking for, but that just means trawling through the twitterverse to see what the most popular and most relevant phrases are.

I hope this finally gets people understanding what i'm trying to do. I'm finding it quite frustrating that no matter how many times i try to explain this, no body seems to get the point of it.

think i should explain it really...

my boobs lighting up actually has a communicative purpose.

each LED shows when a certain word is found in this twitter feed.



and here's the code controlling it all:

arduino code:


//getting it to keep one light lit up

int timer = 10000000; // The higher the number, the slower the timing.
int happy[] = { 5, 6,}; // an array of pin numbers
int sad[] = { 7, 8 };
int meh[] = { 9, 10 };
int love[] = { 11, 12 };
int fuming[] = { 13, 14 };
int num_pins = 10; // the number of pins (i.e. the length of the array)
int val;

void setup()
{
Serial.begin(9600);

int i;

for (i = 0; i < num_pins; i++) // the array elements are numbered from 0 to num_pins - 1
pinMode(happy[i], OUTPUT); // set each pin as an output
pinMode(sad[i], OUTPUT);
pinMode(meh[i], OUTPUT);
pinMode(love[i], OUTPUT);
pinMode(fuming[i], OUTPUT);
}

void loop()
{
int i;

if (Serial.available()) {
val = Serial.read();
if (val == 'A') {
digitalWrite(happy[i], HIGH);
}
else {
digitalWrite(happy[i], LOW);
}


if (val == 'B') {
digitalWrite(sad[i], HIGH);
}
else {
digitalWrite(sad[i], LOW);
}

if (val == 'C') {
digitalWrite(meh[i], HIGH);
}
else {
digitalWrite(meh[i], LOW);
}

if (val == 'D') {
digitalWrite(love[i], HIGH);
}
else {
digitalWrite(love[i], LOW);
}

if (val == 'E') {
digitalWrite(fuming[i], HIGH);
}
else {
digitalWrite(fuming[i], LOW);
}
}


}


and the processing code:


//finds a word, sends a signal to the lilypad then stops the loop.

import processing.serial.*;

Serial port;

String[] tokens; //array
int counter;

void setup() {
size(100, 100);

println(Serial.list());
port = new Serial(this,Serial.list()[0], 9600);

//load file and split up words
String[] lines = loadStrings("http://twitter.com/allemotional");
String allText = join(lines, " ");
tokens = splitTokens(allText, " ,.?!:;[]-");

}

//so it's now pulling in that sentence and splitting it up.

void draw() {
background(255);
fill(0);

String s = tokens[counter];
counter = (counter +1) % tokens.length;
//look at the words one at a time please



//is the word there?
if (s.equals("happy")) {
println("happy");
port.write('A');
noLoop(); //DON'T LOOP IT BAHBEE.


}

if (s.equals("sad")) {
println("sad");
port.write('B');
noLoop(); //DON'T LOOP IT BAHBEE.

}

if (s.equals("meh")) {
println("meh");
port.write('C');
noLoop(); //DON'T LOOP IT BAHBEE.

}

if (s.equals("love")) {
println("love");
port.write('D');
noLoop(); //DON'T LOOP IT BAHBEE.

}

if (s.equals("fuming")) {
println("fuming");
port.write('E');
noLoop(); //DON'T LOOP IT BAHBEE.

}

}


i need to think more about the words that i'm looking for, they really need to reflect what people say in twitter.

looking at twitter

I've now got a piece of code that looks at a twitter feed and sends that information to an arduino board:

arduino code:

//getting it to keep one light lit up

int timer = 10000000; // The higher the number, the slower the timing.
int happy[] = { 6, 7,}; // an array of pin numbers
int spiffing[] = { 8, 9 };
int num_pins = 6; // the number of pins (i.e. the length of the array)
int val;

void setup()
{
Serial.begin(9600);

int i;

for (i = 0; i < num_pins; i++) // the array elements are numbered from 0 to num_pins - 1
pinMode(happy[i], OUTPUT); // set each pin as an output
pinMode(spiffing[i], OUTPUT);
}

void loop()
{
int i;

if (Serial.available()) {
val = Serial.read();
if (val == 'A') {
digitalWrite(happy[i], HIGH);
}
else {
digitalWrite(happy[i], LOW);
}


if (val == 'B') {
digitalWrite(spiffing[i], HIGH);
}
else {
digitalWrite(spiffing[i], LOW);
}
}
}


processing code:

//finds a word, sends a signal to the lilypad then stops the loop.

import processing.serial.*;

Serial port;

String[] tokens; //array
int counter;

void setup() {
size(100, 100);

println(Serial.list());
port = new Serial(this,Serial.list()[0], 9600);

//load file and split up words
String[] lines = loadStrings("http://twitter.com/allemotional");
String allText = join(lines, " ");
tokens = splitTokens(allText, " ,.?!:;[]-");

}

//so it's now pulling in that sentence and splitting it up.

void draw() {
background(255);
fill(0);

String s = tokens[counter];
counter = (counter +1) % tokens.length;
//look at the words one at a time please



//is the word there?
if (s.equals("happy")) {
println("happy");
port.write('A');
noLoop(); //DON'T LOOP IT BAHBEE.


}

if (s.equals("spiffing")) {
println("spiffing");
port.write('B');
noLoop(); //DON'T LOOP IT BAHBEE.

}

}


it's not perfect. i just need to sort out a way of getting the program to delay then restart after finding a word. That piece of code is eluding me at the moment.

stalking allemotional:

i've created a new twitter account, called allemotional, to use with my processing program. All it says at the moment is that it's happy, but as i test out more and more words it'll soon build up. I've also used yahoo pipes to create a RSS feed of the twitter feed that processing likes. It didn't like the twitter RSS very much.

I'm working on Liams mini mac, it's freaking tiny!!!

final-ish ideas and mock up

sketchlings:

scribble scribble scribble.
thinking more in a simple vector-ish style, with a better idea of where i want to put things.

and here's the mock up:

one has been spending quite some time pratting about in illustrator, but needs to learn to tidy up her pen-age.
it's quite twitterish.

ideas:

but with a big giant paper mache sun head, stalking his old school friend.
he'll have a myspace, facebook and twitter page, all the tools of a good stalker. he'll add as many people as he possibly can. he'll upload his stalker photos and tag his stalk-eee in his photos. he'll update his twitter with his where abouts and his current thoughts.

gosh darn it, the sun want's friends and he's going to get them.

interactive design rationale

i've decided to work on the second life gallery space brief, and since we're allowed to work in pairs on this one i will be working with liam.
i chose this brief because it has the second life element and the social network site, so i'll be getting a chance to develop my second life skills and my web 2.0 ones aswell. and i want to see what is possible with emerging web technologies.

what both me and laim are hoping to do with this brief is to make something in second life that reflects the possibilities of what can be done there, instead of relying on something based on what we see in real life. although i think it will be worthwhile looking at some real life architecture to see how we could adapt these ideas into second life. we want to get across the idea of what is possible in a metaverse instead of creating a comfort zone.

i'd also like the chance to play with twitter again, and i'm hoping that since i'm working in a pair this time i can work on my group skills some more.

typical...

i find a website of amazing twitter and flickr mashup amazingness, view the source and all the comments explaining everything is in french...

i don't speak french...
it's amusing though...

// Si elle est appelée sans paramètres,
// cette fonction renvoie une valeur en virgule flottante indiquant la version Flash Player ou 0.0
// ex : Flash Player 7r14 renvoie 7.14
// Si appelé avec reqMajorVer, reqMinorVer, reqRevision renvoie true si cette version ou une version ultérieure est disponible
function DetectFlashVer(reqMajorVer, reqMinorVer, reqRevision

dammit... Michio Kaku told me that english was going to be the language of the global community, and of the "elites".

but it reminded me of the AIDO page by brendan dawes, which is probably more do-able.
(woo! 100th post!)

i think we hit a psychic wall

researching twitter api and mash ups and making my head explode.

so much code that i don't understand makes my head hurt.
and i'm having to use safari to blog and check email which is just plain WEIRD.

anyway...
i first tried looking at the badges on the twitter site, which i thought i would be able to customise relatively easily. i stared at the code until my head felt a bit numb, and then found the twitter fan wiki which contains loads of cool mashups, i especially like twitter in 3d (oooh it's swooshy) and celly which is very cute.

there's also handy descriptions of the twitter api which i'm hoping i might be able to make sense out of. but to be honest i'm not sure. it makes my brain numb.

i've also been looking at stuff by john maeda which i'll blog about later... mwaaah...

catch up...

plans many plans...

ideas:

- my second life clone, called fio kohime is already in existence. since so much of my time is spent on second life, i've decided to create an identical avatar so that people can see what it's actually like to be me in second life. at the moment she's pretty much identical to fio kaminski in appearance, i just have to make her inventory identical too (easier said than done, damn permissions). i was planning to make her password openly available to anyone really, but too many people have said the word "machinima", which makes me a little worried my little clone would be abused, although it would be interesting to see what people did with her and what she would end up looking like. It could be an interesting little existence.

- a website mashed up from several different things, but mainly including abuse of java script. or flash. i dunno.

inputs:
- twitter
- myspace
- facebook
- digital photos from a crappy 4 mega pixel camera for the authentic crappy photo web look
- daft punk's "technologic" lyrics seem to describe my day. maybe include mp3 somewhere. or just use lyrics in ANNOYING POP UPS FROM HELL. i used to be able to make pop ups but then pop up blockers kept blocking them :(

so i need to:
- finish making clone
- plan website (layouts going to be pretty random, but i need to plan which page follows which etc.)
- take shitloads of photos
- continue twitter ramblings, and using myspace and facebook
- relearn java!

twittering

blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah