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Dev8D: The best of Dev8D

gibbons — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 17:34:59 +0000

This year’s Dev8D has now come to an end, so sit back and take a look at what happened over the three days…

Dev8D: Kinect-ing with Quadrocopters

gibbons — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 12:21:22 +0000

DevXS last year was a platform for a University of Aberystwyth led team to show off their multi-mobileOS quadrocopter. Mere months down the line, and Dave Tarrant is demonstrating the speed of technological evolution with a 3D motion control system for the flying machine, using an Xbox Kinect.

Dave believes that a potential application for this system is to teach younger children and those with learning difficulties about spacial awareness:

“There are certain beneficial applications, if you like, of the technology. For example, educating young children who have learning difficulties about 3d spacial awareness by being able to interact in 3D. The Kinect is great already for playing games and interacting using full body motion, rather than a controller than you necessarily have to learn, because it is very intuitive”.

Dev8D: Day two reflection with Mahendra and Christopher

gibbons — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 23:47:24 +0000

As the sun sets on the second day of Dev8D 2012, organisers Mahendra Mahey and Christopher Gutteridge reflect on the days events.

The duo talk about the success of fledgling developer, Alex Bilby, after his talk on HTML5 attracted an unexpected amount of interest, as well as discussing lightning talks, the new unconference format and tomorrow’s ‘Best of Dev8D’ programme.

Dev8D: Meet the developers: Half way point

gibbons — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 15:49:22 +0000

Lunch time on Wednesday marked the half way point in this year’s Dev8D, and we caught up with some of the developers to see how they think the event is going, and what they have enjoyed the most so far.

Dev8D: 3D Printing with Graham Klyne

gibbons — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 11:57:57 +0000

One of the most exciting and promising pieces of technology to be on display over the last few years at Dev8D has been the 3D printing RepRaps – Machines capable of replicating up to 50% of its own components.

This year, Oxford University’s Graham Klyne shows off 2nd and 3rd generation machines, which have been built from their respective parent generation machines.

While a large scale commercial application is yet to be found for the RepRaps, Graham believes the 3D printing industry will follow that of digital image printing.

“I can imagine that we can see an ecosystem build up which would have parallels with what we can see with printing digital photos. The possibility of creating your own images – You can print them at home if you want to and if you have the right kind of equipment, but you can also take them and get them printed fairly cheaply at a store. There is a real possibility that we can see a much more competatively priced bureau service for realisation of 3D design”.

Dev8D: Introducing the event: Mahendra Mahey

gibbons — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 13:39:24 +0000

Fresh after launching Dev8D 2012, Mahendra Mahey explains how this event is different than in previous years.

This year, the focus is well and truly on ensuring participants embrace the social aspect of the conference, with a new-look programme designed with the purpose of bringing new people together.

“One of the most important aspects of Dev8D is that developers meet each other – Not to hang around in the same gangs but to meet new people. What we’re doing this year is giving people the chance to declare themselves, in terms of what they can offer. Also, we have got a number of projects taking place”.

Mahendra also outlined some of the stand-out events over the weeks, including experimentation with a nuclear magnetic resonance scanner, to see what developers can do with the data that is outputted.