Matt Jones Tech
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  • I Created an RFID Check-In Prototype With a Raspberry Pi

    All the technical details (and more awesome pi projects!): https://pimylifeup.com/raspberry-pi-rfid-attendance-system/

    RFID Check-In on a Raspberry Pi

    Hey guys! What’s going on my name is Matt and today I’m not doing a museum update and I’m not doing a 3d house model those
    are two other projects that are crazy and I’ve been doing other stuff and so…


    This video is for one of the projects that fell through the cracks if I don’t
    make a video about it no one will ever know that I did it so let’s do it!

    So a while back somebody came to me and asked me to do a project for a small like a kids ministry thing at church and they needed a way to get kids checked in and have like an account for each kid on this app, right… And so they needed to play games on the app and they you know keep they earn points and all this kind of stuff to kind of keep track of all of everybody’s stuff. So the first phase of creating this app I thought will they have these bracelets that have RFID tags on them and so if you could use that to track the kids and keep track of how many points they have each. That might be a good starting point so I created an RFID chicken system as a prototype for the app that never happened so here you go:

    Alright guys, so the very first thing that I grabbed was a Raspberry Pi and an RFID reader writer module so I can read the the actual tags themselves. So once I got those things together, I started to work on the wiring of the RFID module to the Raspberry Pi itself. And so that was put together with a breadboard and if you guys want some more information on exactly how that’s all rigged up there’s a link and in the description. And so once I had all the wires run from the RFID module to the Raspberry Pi it was time to boot up. And so once I booted up I was able to create two Python files and save them in a special RFID directory inside of the Raspberry Pi.

    So the first one is called read and it does just what you might expect it to it will read the identification number on the RFID tag and so every single tag that is created has an ID number and so the read function inside of the script will print out that number and any other information that’s written to that particular tag if nothing else is written it will just print the ID so
    that is the script for reading the tags and then there’s a second script that is
    write PI and it does the same exact thing except for your writing additional
    information to the tag so in order for the scripts to function you need to
    execute them so first off I’ll just execute the read function so once you
    execute it it’s going to enter a like a listening mode so when it detects an
    RFID tag that has been tapped to the sensor it will say okay I see the tag
    and here’s the ID number any other additional information written to that
    tag and in order to write to the tag you just execute the right program and then it’ll ask you to enter a little bit of text or whatever information that you want to associate with that particular tag so for my example I just put a string of text that says it is written and then once I wrote that to the tag I
    was able to read that information back and output that to the terminal.

    Alright guys thanks for hanging out if you want to know more about this RFID reader writer I have some more information and technical details and wiring diagrams and all that good stuff in the link below and hope you guys enjoyed this one we’re gonna be neck we’re gonna be back next time probably on home design 3d animation need things but I’d like to
    get back on the museum train that’d be great so we’ll see how it goes
    and I’ll see you guys next week peace out!

    matt

    May 12, 2020
    General Computing, Linux, Raspberry Pi
    attendance, check-in, DIY, python, raspberry pi, rfid
  • [VIDEO] How To Make An Outdoor Fogger

    So in summary…

    Danny says there was a guy who posted a video on YouTube a while back featuring this same method for creating an outdoor fogger. (food-grade mineral oil inside a propane-powered outdoor fogger), but for whatever reason, it was taken down. So this video is an attempt to keep the idea alive, and mostly just stick it here for me to reference when I forget, or hopefully help others along the way.

    Let’s make an outdoor fogger

    All you’ll need for this job is:

    • insect fogger (approx $70 at Home Depot, but I’ve seen them as low as $50 on Amazon)
    • propane (a pack of 3 runs about $25) on Amazon
    • food-grade mineral oil (about $21 per gallon on Amazon)

    Hopefully this will help someone down the road. Happy filmmaking, have fun, and don’t burn down your neighborhood. Propane is dangerous. Please fog your movie scene responsibly, I’m not responsible for anything.

    If any of these links quit working, please let me know so I can update them. Thanks!

    Also, just a heads up- keep an eye out for a future video (it will be linked here when it goes live) where you can see me and Danny using this exact fogger setup for a short film shot in just 48 hours… It was pretty wild.

    matt

    December 15, 2019
    Filmmaking, Lifestyle, Tutorial
    DIY, filmmaking, fog, haze, movies, special effects
  • How To Set Up a Raspberry Pi 3 B+

    Prerequisites

    For this tutorial, I’m going to assume that you’ve got enough hardware to get started. And if you got your Raspberry Pi as part of a kit, then you should be good to go. You should have the following:

    • Raspberry Pi board
    • Raspberry Pi power supply (micro USB Output 5V DC 2.5A Regulated, Input 100V to 240V AC)
    • Raspberry Pi case (not technically required, but I definitely want to protect my pi!)
    • Micro SD card (at least a class 10)
    • HDMI cable (full size, male to male)
    • Monitor or television capable of displaying output from a full HDMI port
    • USB-A mouse
    • USB-A keyboard
    • A computer
    • A micro SD card reader

    Download your OS

    You can run tons of different operating systems on your Raspberry Pi, but for this demo, we’ll go with the OS officially supported by the Raspberry Pi Foundation called Raspian (based on Linux Debian). You can download the operating system here. Once you have the operating system downloaded, you’ll want to head over and download the latest version of Etcher.

    Etcher is a great, simple, open source software used to create bootable media. Use Etcher to select your downloaded copy of Raspian. Next, select your micro SD card as the volume to burn to. Then click go! It will take several minutes to write the OS to the micro SD and then validate the burn. Once it’s complete, eject your SD card and you’re ready for the next step.

    Boot your new Raspberry Pi

    With your freshly burned SD card inserted into your Pi, connect the keyboard, mouse, and monitor, and plug power into your pi. There isn’t a power button on the pi, so as soon as power starts running through the board, it will automatically start the boot process. You should be greeted with a simple setup wizard to help you configure some settings that will be applied every time you boot your pi in the future.

    That’s it! Enjoy your new Pi!

    matt

    April 30, 2019
    Lifestyle, Linux, Raspberry Pi
    debian, DIY, linux, pi, raspberry pi, raspberry pi 3, raspberry pi 3 b+, raspian, setup
  • The Benefits of Lifelong Learning

    There are lots of you out there who are lifelong learners like myself, and you guys don\’t require any convincing because knowledge has always felt like the worthwhile reward for taking the time to learn something new. For those of us who frequently find that you don’t have the time to sit down and learn something new, let me take a few seconds to explain how taking the time to learn something new has ended up saving me a small fortune in parts and service.

    When I turned 21, my parents got me a brand new mid-2009 MacBook Pro. I absolutely loved that thing. Everything I use in my job today, I learned on that MacBook. I used it to learn video editing, motion graphics, photo editing, and even 3D. Eventually, I wanted to upgrade my specs (my biggest 3D render job took me nearly a week (168 hours) to complete!) so naturally, I went to the best tech support I had available to me to upgrade from a spinning drive to a SSD: Geek Squad. About 2 weeks and $180 later, I swore I would learn everything I could about computers to prevent myself from being taken.

    The learning begins.

    It begins

    In my line of work (video production and animation) I work a lot with computers. As can be expected, computers will eventually get old, have problems, slow down, and otherwise stop working. In today’s technology-driven world, with new computer models being release every few months, salespeople are always trained to push the “You should just get a new computer” approach. Great for their business; not great for my wallet. So instead of buying a brand new computer every 3-5 years, why not learn how to build my own computer? That way, when parts get old, everything starts running slow, I can just slowly upgrade it over the years instead of buying a brand new machine every few years. Sounds great, right?

    I’m not saying this plan was easy. It took me several months to research how to assemble a computer and several months to learn which parts did which job, and how they all work together. And once I knew all the parts required to build a computer, I now had way more decisions to make. Instead of “Which computer do I buy?” Now I was thinking, “Which motherboard should I buy? Is this motherboard compatible with my CPU choice?” A few more months of research later, eventually I had to make a choice. So I ordered my parts one by one.

    I love it when a plan comes together

    One by one they arrived, and I used several online guides to help me assemble my first computer. It ran Ubuntu Linux (I couldn’t afford a copy of Windows), and it was my first ever computer build. Overall, it took about a year to learn everything I could about each of the parts and save up enough money to buy all the parts.

    Today, that same computer has payed for itself over and over again because I took the time to learn about all of the components and I’ve used it to complete several video and animation jobs for clients. This is no “and he lived happily ever after” story, either. The custom build hasn’t been without its problems. However, learning the basics and even more valuable, learning how to learn, has helped me repair my computer, and keep it running smoothly for several years. Now when I encounter my next problem, I’ll never have to rely on a tech service ever again.

    matt

    October 7, 2018
    Lifestyle
    build, custom, DIY, education, goals, learning, lifestyle, new years, new years resolution, resolution

Prove all things; hold fast that which is good. 1 Thess 5:21