February 2019 Learn More Links

The Case for Useless Robots

Lego Mindstorms Wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lego_Mindstorms

Lego Mindstorms Projects

https://www.makeuseof.com/tag/10-jaw-dropping-lego-mindstorms-projects/

Article about 2019 VEX Worlds

https://www.kitv.com/story/39780374/top-school-robotics-teams-head-to-2019-vex-worlds

SIMONE GIERTZ’S LATEST INVENTION: A ROBOT THAT SPILLS SOUP ALL OVER HER

https://nerdist.com/simone-giertz-soup-serving-robot/

Seven absurd inventions set to change the world forever

https://www.cnn.com/style/article/inventor-simone-giertz-designer/index.html

Gas Stations in Space

Robotic Refueling Mission NASA facts and many sets of press releases

https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=1787
https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/news/spx16-research
https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/news/rrm3

Press Conference Kennedy Space Flight Center December 4, 2018 Jill McGuire (Broadcast on NASA TV)

https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/files/issrdc_2013-07-17-1600_mcguire2013.pdf

Blurry Circles

History of SketchUp

https://mastersketchup.com/history-of-sketchup/

SketchUp for Kids

http://learningfromcities.blogspot.com/2014/01/sketchup-for-kids.html

Teaching 3D with ModelMetricks

http://www.3dvinci.net/forteachersmodelmetricks.htm

How to Create Your First 3D Model in SketchUp: A Beginner-Friendly Introduction

https://i.materialise.com/blog/en/first-3d-model-in-sketchup-tutorial/

Finding, making, and using incredible SketchUp textures

https://blog.sketchup.com/article/finding-making-and-using-incredible-sketchup-textures

File Systems

Comparison of Linux file systems along with a good explanation of journaling

https://www.howtogeek.com/howto/33552/htg-explains-which-linux-file-system-should-you-choose/

An old Ars Technica piece on the history of file systems with fantastic history sections

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2008/03/past-present-future-file-systems/

An article about why USB sticks use FAT32

https://www.howtogeek.com/177529/htg-explains-why-are-removable-drives-still-using-fat32-instead-of-ntfs/

Chicago USO Event

Online Coding Camps in Minecraft

https://blog.connectedcamps.com/online-coding-camp-in-minecraft/

Get Started with a Raspberry Pi

https://www.imore.com/how-get-started-using-raspberry-pi

Minecraft Story Mode

Minecraft Story Mode

https://telltale.com/series/minecraft-story-mode/

Adventure Maps

http://www.minecraftmaps.com/adventure-maps

How To Install a Minecraft Map

http://www.minecraftmaps.com/info/how-to-install-a-minecraft-map

C Programming Language

A tutorial on C by the author of a famous online book about network programming

https://beej.us/guide/bgc/html/single/bgc.html

A decent tutorial just on pointers

http://pw1.netcom.com/~tjensen/ptr/pointers.htm

Telling Interactive Stories in Scratch

Our story so far

https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/256976067/

How to make stories in Scratch

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TJO-oI8dBTs

How to use Scratch for digital storytelling

https://www.commonsense.org/education/blog/how-to-use-scratch-for-digital-storytelling

For teachers

http://www.literacyfromscratch.org.uk/teaching/creating.htm

Make your own virtual pet in Scratch

https://wecancodeit.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/Make-Your-Own-Virtual-Pet-in-Scratch-r1.pdf

Scratch resources for teachers

https://www.educationworld.com/a_tech/scratch-programming-classroom-activity-ideas.shtml

Cardboard Circuits

WikiHow: Making a Simple Electrical Circuit

https://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Simple-Electrical-Circuit

Electrical Circuit Projects for Elementary Students

https://learning-center.homesciencetools.com/article/circuit-science-projects-for-elementary/
https://www.shareitscience.com/2017/09/DIY-paper-circuit-board-games-STEM.html

An Electrical Circuit Quiz Board

https://www.teachingtreasures.com.au/K-10Projects/quizboard/quizboard.htm

How do Multiplayer Games Really Work?

About Game Servers

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_server

Client-Server Networks vs Peer-to-Peer Networks

https://www.techrepublic.com/article/understanding-the-differences-between-client-server-and-peer-to-peer-networks/

What Gamers Need To Know About Network Synchronization In Games

https://www.makeuseof.com/tag/gamers-network-synchronization-games/

Paper Clips Run Amok

Paperclip Maximizer

https://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/Paperclip_maximizer

AI and the Paperclip Problem

https://voxeu.org/article/ai-and-paperclip-problem

The Way the World Ends: Not a Bang But a Paperclip

https://www.wired.com/story/the-way-the-world-ends-not-with-a-bang-but-a-paperclip/

FizzBuzz

About the modulus operator

https://www.khanacademy.org/computing/computer-science/cryptography/modarithmetic/a/what-is-modular-arithmetic

A detailed article about FizzBuzz

https://www.tomdalling.com/blog/software-design/fizzbuzz-in-too-much-detail/

Twenty Ways to Fizz Buzz

https://ditam.github.io/posts/fizzbuzz/

A complex mathematical solution to FizzBuzz

https://read.klipse.tech/the-most-elegant-implementation-of-fizzbuzz/

TIC-80 Maps and Music

Bruno’s platformer tutorial

https://medium.com/@btco_code/writing-a-platformer-for-the-tic-80-virtual-console-6fa737abe476

A neat, free, tracker for making chiptunes

http://deflemask.com/

Tutorial to make a simple platformer on the TIC-80

https://www.infinitelimit.net/article/simple-platformer-tic-80

Cell Towers

The First Cellular Phone

https://www.aarp.org/politics-society/history/info-2018/first-cell-phone-call.html

Invasive Species (disguised towers)

https://www.wired.com/2013/03/dillon-marsh-invasive-species/

How Cell Towers Work

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ct0wFde9XcI

How Cell Towers Work

https://wonderopolis.org/wonder/how-do-cell-towers-work

How Text Messages are Sent

https://lifehacker.com/this-video-explains-how-your-texts-are-sent-from-one-ph-1784867035

The Cell Phone Tower Debate

https://www.wired.com/2005/08/cell-phone-tower-debate-grows/

Triangle Generator

Introduction to Python

https://www.w3schools.com/python/python_intro.asp
https://www.kidscodecs.com/resources/programming/python/

Python for Kids

https://www.kidscodecs.com/python-for-kids/

About Loops

https://www.tutorialspoint.com/python/python_while_loop.htm
https://www.pythonforbeginners.com/control-flow-2/python-for-and-while-loops

More Python activities

https://www.kidscodecs.com/create-turtles-python/
https://www.kidscodecs.com/python-animation-bird-wave/

Requests and Responses

How to Inspect Web Page Elements

https://www.lifewire.com/get-inspect-element-tool-for-browser-756549

What is a Server?

https://www.lifewire.com/servers-in-computer-networking-817380
https://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/server

HTTP Responses and Requests

https://wiki.kidzsearch.com/wiki/Hypertext_Transfer_Protocol

Browser caches

https://askleo.com/whats_a_browser_cache_how_do_i_clear_it_and_why_would_i_want_to/

Web browser history

https://www.kidscodecs.com/web-browser-history/

Chinese New Year Lantern

Lanterns Go High Tech

https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/inpictures/taiwan-lantern-festival-tradition-tech-180306063854438.html

History

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lantern_Festival

Video (in Mandarin Chinese)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3T29HMQ428A

Festivities

https://www.ourawesomeplanet.com/awesome/2018/03/taiwan-lantern-festival.html

Traditions

https://www.thebeijinger.com/blog/2018/02/02/celebrating-lantern-festival-beijing-traditions-and-lantern-fairs

DIY Paper and Wire Lantern (Instructables)

https://www.instructables.com/id/Paper-and-Wire-Lantern/

Atlas Institute Science and Art Education

https://www.colorado.edu/atlas/2017/08/10/lighting-way-science-and-art-education

Luminous Science

https://www.playfulcomputation.group/luminous-science.html

Laboratory for Playful Computation

https://www.playfulcomputation.group/

NeoPixel LEDs (individually addressable)

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B018XAELE4/ref=od_aui_detailpages00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

micro:bit

https://uk.pi-supply.com/products/microbit?aelia_cs_currency=USD&feed_country=US&gclid=CjwKEAjwutXIBRDV7-SDvdiNsUoSJACIlTqltlEE-BbPdjgzEWv_A7qkXEW7RmkC0Bat4JiAP1XexhoCWX3w_wcB

micro:bit coding environment

https://microbit.org/

Lantern Light Festival

https://lanternlightfestival.com/

Man in the Middle Attacks

The Difference between HTTP and HTTPS

https://www.globalsign.com/en/blog/the-difference-between-http-and-https/

Should I Buy from This Site? How to Know if a Website is Secure

https://www.digicert.com/blog/buy-site-know-website-secure/

What is an SSL certificate?

https://us.norton.com/internetsecurity-how-to-ssl-certificates-what-consumers-need-to-know.html

Defend against Man in the Middle Attacks

https://www.networkworld.com/article/2180467/wireless/mit-researchers-craft-defense-against-wireless-man-in-middle-attacks.html

Author

  • Tim Slavin

    Tim is an award-winning writer and technologist who enjoys teaching tech to non-technical people. He has many years experience with web sites and applications in business, technical, and creative roles. He and his wife have two kids, now teenagers, who are mad about video games.

Also In The February 2019 Issue

The craft world and the tech world collide in this fun, hands-on activity.

For twenty three years, since 1996, cars have used computers to control different parts of the car.

Synchronizing games with players from all around the world is no easy task.

A simple thought experiment sheds light on the dangers of AI. Can we stop the earth being buried in paperclips?

‘Files’ may be easy concepts for humans, but not for computers. What’s going on inside your operating system?

Two ways to play Minecraft with an overarching storyline. Experience the game like never before!

Helping kids fall in love with coding through Minecraft mods and Raspberry Pis.

A better, smoother way to direct your theatrical masterpiece.

How hackers can steal the messages you send over the internet, and how to tell if your communications are secure.

It’s not as simple as it seems. Can you solve this classic programming problem?

Ever wondered what happens when you connect to a website? Time to dive into the secrets of networking!

Links from the bottom of all the February 2019 articles, collected in one place for you to print, share, or bookmark.

Interesting stories about science and technology for February 2019.

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