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A look at 'itemv'
The 'itemv' (ISO 7816EMV smartcard analysis) board came back last week, and it works great! I wanted to point out a few things that are noteworthy about this board.The ample "spare" space on this board...
View ArticleThe end of myths -- solving one of our industry's nastiest of problems
In a series of past blog posts (first, second) I've described some of the myths surrounding component libraries. They were, in fact, merely symptoms of a chronic ailment of our industry -- I was using...
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New board: 'redditoken'
I've been a lurker on Reddit since pretty much the beginning, and can say that aside from periods of rage-quit that lasted a few weeks at a time, I've been visiting the site pretty much every day....
View Article'pease' are back!
The 'pease' board are back from Eurocircuits, and look great! I hope that Bob, who died two years ago, would have liked them, and their purpose -- celebrating his work, and teaching people how to solder.
View ArticleUpdated website
Just a quick not to point out that I've just updated Boldport's homepage: http://www.boldport.com. There are new images, slightly changed layout and a brand new page for the 'pease' board. It's amazing...
View ArticleShowing off the 'redditoken'
A month ago I've written about the 'redditoken', a Reddit themed circuit board. The tokens are back from OSH Park, and here's a short video about themWhat do you think?
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New board: 'wuthering'
The omnipresent Andrew Back has asked me to design a small board / badge for the upcoming Wuthering Bytes Workshop in Hebden Bridge. We decided on a simple circuit -- something based on littlewire...
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A new teaching board for The Centre of Computing History in Cambridge
The Centre for Computing History has moved to Cambridge, and has been officially open for a couple of months. Jason Fitzpatrick -- the man who has made all this happen -- and his team of volunteers...
View ArticleEngineers, assemble!
The EDA industry is hostile to innovation. I thought that that was a pretty strong statement until I uttered it in a talk and an industry veteran remarked that that was actually an...
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The 'lifegame'
My friend Mike is getting married on Saturday (tomorrow). Both him and his soon-to-be-wife enjoy video games -- as do I! -- and I thought that a game-themed gift would be nice. Since I'm all into this...
View ArticleJust applied for YCombinator
I suppose that it isn't that ordinary to publicise this sort of thing, but I just hit the button for the Winter 2014 YCombinator application. I'm not that hopeful, though -- I think that my application...
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The origins of PCBmodE
I've been obsessively doodling all my life. I've got notebooks and pieces of paper full of abstract drawings of meaningless stuff, from my teenage years until today. Any time there's a piece of paper...
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An update
Lots has been happening on the Boldport front. There's 'cuttlefish', an educational board made for Embecosm; 'deadwood', a tribute to the cordwood PCB assembly from the 1960s, which will be sold by...
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An engineer's emergency kit business card
Circuit board business cards have been done. But since circuit boards are, literally, my business, I felt that I needed one too. Of course it also had to be special. Research and experimentation took a...
View ArticleIn defence of the "sloppy" engineer
When things go wrong it's tempting to blame the "sloppy, incompetent" engineer. Security breach? Bad board? Cumbersome UI? Ah, it's that stupid engineer again! Not the overbearing boss, lack of...
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I'm an engineer!
Teenagers used to have posters of Einstein on their walls. Decades pass and now they have Miley Cyrus adorning their rooms. What's next, a cat playing the piano? Scientists and engineers' contribution...
View ArticleSo you want to start an EDA business?
It's New Year's day. We look ahead. Some of you may be thinking today of starting an EDA business. I've been an EDA user all of my professional life and have tried and failed in starting an EDA...
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oomlaut wins 'superhero' board for £105!
I ran an informal auction for one of two 'superhero' boards over on Twitter. After a lot of fun and puns, oomlaut had the top bid of £105! All the funds from this auction will go towards PCBmodE...
View ArticleI won't be using an open source hardware logo on my boards any longer
I'm very enthusiastic about open source hardware. I've written PCBmodE, which is open source software, and unless a client does not want it to be, the boards I design with it are open source hardware...
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Laser cutter fun
In a couple of weeks it will have been a year since I blogged about 'pieceof'coming back from fab. It was the first board I made with PCBmodE and it's still one of my favourites. To celebrate this, I'd...
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