Wayne Gramlich's Electronics Projects

This document only lists my electronics related personal projects. The full list of all my personal projects is available along with my current priority list.

My current electronics related personal projects are:

Hobbiest Electronic Computer Aided Design System: Over the past decade or so, there has been a real progress in the ability to layout and manufacture printed circuit boards. The HobECAD system allows for schematic capture and printed circuit board layout on systems running the X window system. The code is written in STIPPLE, so it is not as portable as most people would like.
PIC Programmer: This is my own version of a cheap parallel port PIC programmer. This one differs from a lot of the others out there in that it actually includes the power supply as part of the design. Also, this one can program all of the PIC12x, PIC14x, and PIC16x versions (not the PIC17x though.)
µCL -- Micro-Controller Language: Some of my projects use PIC microcontrollers from Microchip. Rather than programming them in PIC assembler, I prefer to program them in a higher level language that I designed call µCL. Unlike ANSI-C, µCL is has a number of constructs that are specifically taylored for the microcontroller environment. µCL is currently written in Tcl/Tk so that it will run on pretty much all 32-bit platforms.
Robobricks: This is a bunch of electronic modules that allow you to plug together the electronics for a small robot quickly.
Robobricks2: This is a follow up project to the previous one. It uses a daisy chain bus instead of a star architecture.
Nuts and Volts Article Listing: There is a magazine called Nuts and Volts that I subscribe to. They have enough interesting projects and articles in them that I type in the table of contents for each month into a file so that I can easily search it.
Selected Data Sheets: Recently, I have started keeping copies of the data sheets that I down load. I find that keeping them organized actually saves time in the long haul.
SimpliciNet: SimpliciNet is a simple network for connecting low cost microcontrollers to the internet using their serial ports.
Extensible Programmer: The EMDP1 (Extensible Multiple Device Programmer revision 1) is an open hardware project for programming multiple integrated circuits.
Linux Parallel Port Server: Access to the parallel port under Linux requires root access. I have written a server that runs as root that provoides strict access to a single parallel port to non root enabled programs via a TCP/IP connection.
PIC Support Software: The cost of One Time Programmable (OTC) Microchip PIC controllers has dropped so low, it no longer makes sense to do descrete logic implemenation. So, I have decided to use PIC chips in some of my projects as well.
Stepper Motor Control: There are a bunch of projects that require a computer control stepper motor. Some of my manufacturing projects will use stepper motors in them.
MCS-51 Support Software: In addition to needing a way to electronically program a microcontroller chip, I also need a way to write the software to stuff into the chip. While I am perfectly capable of writing an assembler, a while ago learned a trick of writing programs that are executed to generate the programs; these programs use a library of routines where each routine roughly corresponds to a single microcontroller instruction. I have written a library of routines for dealing with MCS-51 opcodes.
Atmel Microcontroller Programmer: This is an abandoned project!!! For a while I was going to build a Atmel MCS-51 programmer using one of the Atmel application notes as a guide. Then I saw a more generic programmer design in an issue of Circuit Celler Ink. I have decided to use that design instead. You are welcome to dig around in my Atmel Programmer directory, but don't expect to see any further progress down there.
Random Bit Generator: Ever since I attended a presentation on generating balanced random bits given by Prof. David Gifford at M.I.T., I have always wanted to build a random bit generator.