empty post or hidden announcement ?

developping a PRETTY nice interface for … Ableton Live.
it talks about:
- removing the screen
- eat your mouse
- only use your fingers and intuition
- forget your cables

wow… I told too much.

so I have to say:
I’m working actually on a nice project which could be finished quiet soon.
It is a secret.
But I can write here it will be fantastic, user-friendly, beautiful, amazing, reliable!

very soon, we’ll open a newsletter to inform about the last steps before the release.

BE PATIENT !

Designing hardware Printed Circuit Board…

I’m using KiCAD.
It is a pretty nice and complete software, opensource & free.
You can check it and download it here

The most annoying thing is : finding the right components,ok!
Eagle seems to provide much more libraries. But Eagle is expensive if you plan to make a big PCB (by the way, 100 x 80 mm is quite ok for a lot of us. I needed more, so..)

Component in Kicad or even in Eagle are 2 files:
- the schematics (diagrams with pins, logic only)
- the modules (physical trace with correct sizes)

So there are at least 3 solutions for finding the right components:
- looking for here: http://www.kicadlib.org/ or http://per.launay.free.fr/kicad/kicad_php/composant.php
- making your own (it is the best solution. Not too difficult to make schematics & traces. traces should be done with datasheet in hands)
- using a conversion script inside eagle (called an ulp script) : eagle2kicad-0.9b.ulp

for the last way, you have to open the lib you want to convert in Eagle.
Choose ulp in the toolbar, choose the right script (eagle2kicad-0.9b.ulp) & give the 2 names & paths.
Sometimes, it works, sometimes it doesn’t.
as these files (sch & mod) are all full text, I had sometimes to edit them a bit to make them working fine.
but, let’s say… you want to succeed or not ?! so you have to work a bit

some could ask “why do you use kicad yet because you already did the protodeck?”
I’d answer them.

making the controller or not?

a LOT of people writes me about the protodeck.
they want their own.

so should I build a kind of protodeck lite or not?
it could be sold with:
- full patch & scripts to make it plug and play with live
- full apps to use it like a pure monome

the strong point would be the apps provided with that, the compactness, the rgb leds and the great amount of knobs and … shhhh.

how could this be profitable to make it possible ?

(the secret message in that means: guys, prepare your liveset, a new controller will be created soon and let me know if you’re interested!)

training center & hackerspace

Opening a big training center / hackerspace would be so fun.
It could provide courses about high-skill & futuristic technology (from ableton live to JAVA, from C# to hardware hacking, from AS3 to Adobe suite) and it could provide great workshops (streamed on the web, realtime, of course), pretty geeky but professional seminars.
I have many freelance high skilled friends that could work with me. All very nice, strong & loving technology & artistic creation !

I’d love to drive a plane like that.
Not on non-profit mode, not on “only profit needed” mode… just running for the happiness of everyone

I began a french survey about that.
I’d like to spread it EVERYWHERE in France, from company sponsorship services to student potential user, from artists to … you !

If kickstarter existed in Europe, I’d run a big project fund raising for that.
Not sure if it could work.

But I’m sure YOU are a lot interested by that.
even if you weren’t in France, but Belgium, Italy, Spain or UK.
We speak english to with our ugly accent!

So if YOU are interested, you can write me an email.
If you think you could be involved in that on any way, write me too.
“on any way” means:
- spread the survey
- spread the message
- send me nice “good luck” message
- talk to your boss for sponsoring that
- find ideas to provide things
- anything else from your brain cause all your ideas will make the stuff!