Thinking Digital 2010
Wednesday, May 26, 2010 at 6:54AM 
Spending a couple of days in the North East of England attending the annual Thinking Digital conference.
It's my first time, both visiting the North East and also attending TD, but I've heard nothing but good things about both!
I particularly like the idea that the conference is a single track - no decisions to be made on what sessions to attend, or worrying five minutes into a session if you really would have been better off attending the session in the next room. Everyone attends the single track.
Hopefully I'll pick up some good ideas and the conference will give me lots to think about. It's always good to break away from the routine of the usual working week and get some perspective how others working in Digital Media are thinking and acting.
Today (Wednesday) is the first full day of sessions although I travelled up yesterday.
The organisers laid on some special workshops for early arrivals and I opted to attend an "Arduino Power Workshop". I've always been interested in electronics and have fancied a play with one of these devices for a while.
It's basically a programmable chip on a circuit board with various pins exposed, along with a USB connector to connect to a PC or Mac. Attach LEDs, Resistors, Motors, etc to the Arduino and then write some code to control it on the computer. Compile and upload your code to the Arduino and watch it work - magic!
Well I managed to complete all of the exercises but still need to learn a bit more about electronics theory, but it's a great way to get started. A nice touch was that they let us keep the starter kits that we had been using, so I can carry on experimenting when I get home.
Will keep you posted on the TD conference and you can catch any related Tweets by using the hashtag #TDC10
Reader Comments (2)
Oh that sounds fun Don. I remember as a kid playing with electronics kits, and how my Dad always used to start with .....and keep away from the mains power, remember what happened last time!
This time next week I expect to see you going James Bond with the car, controlling it from the iPad :-)
for control computer from iPhone, iPod I prefer to use Actymac VidShots Remote (actymac.com)...