Circuit Cellar Ink 188
March 2006

Table of Contents

4 Jennifer Huber	HTML Task Manager Get Ready to Build
8 John Gorsky	New Product News Versa Mix 8051 family of mixed-signal microcontrollers from Ramtron International Corp. Isolated RoHS-compliant 1-W DC-DC converters from V-Infinity LLC CircuitShell electronics enclosures from CircuitShell, Inc. ION DC Brush Drive motor controller from Performance Motion Devices, Inc. RabbitSys operating system from Rabbit Semiconductor USB-IIRO-16 isolated I/O board from ACCES I/O Products, Inc. AS1910-15 dual-voltage microprocessor supervisory circuits from austriamicrosystems AG
16 Peter Montgomery	Servo Animation Controller If you're into robotics and animatronics, this is the perfect project for you. Peter built a programmable 68HC11-based servo animation controller to bring life to some sophisticated Halloween props. Download: Montgomery-188.zip
24 Paul Beckling Ray Pettit Todd Quasny Robert Watson	Outdoor Mobile Robot Need a rugged yet inexpensive general-purpose outdoor mobile robot? No problem. This foursome of designers explains how to construct one for less than $2,000. Download: Pettit-188.zip
From the Bench 30 Jeff Bachiochi	Simple Robotics Experimentation Want to experiment with an easy-to-use programmable robot? The mobile Scribbler Robot is the perfect system. Not only does it connect directly to your PC, it also comes with free software that enables you to write your own programs. Jeff puts it in play. Download: Bachiochi-188.zip
36 Ethan Leland Kipp Bradford Odest Chadwicke Jenkins	Robot Localization and Control This team shows you how to use wireless nodes to simultaneously localize and control a WowWee Robosapien humanoid robot.The ZigBee nodes' outputs mimic the control signals. A simple GUI makes controlling the robot a cinch. Download: Leland-188.zip
40 Vadym Grygorenko	Digital Compassing Build a Tilt-Compensated Digital Magnetic Compass Vadym built a PSoC-based digital compass with a three-axis magneto-resistive sensor featuring tilt compensation.The system stores calibration data in the PSoC's internal EEPROM. Download: Grygorenko-188.zip
48 Stuart Brorson	Optical Proximity Sensor for Robots Part 1: Simple PCB Design with the gEDA Suite This step-by-step tutorial shows you how to use the Linux-based gEDA suite to create a miniature, PCB-based optical proximity sensor with LED output. It's perfect for mobile robots. Download: Brorson-188.zip
Silicon Update 56 Tom Cantrell	FIR Factor If you want to be able to design a complete four-channel signal processing and filtering solution in minutes rather than days, consider the QF4A512 four-channel signal converter. But before you do, check out Tom's review.
62 Andy Yuen	Concurrent Small-C for PIC18 MCUs You can write concurrent programs for a PIC MCU with the Concurrent Small-C (CSC) programming language. Andy covers the language's main features and then describes a complete multitasking CSC demonstration program. Download: Yuen-188.zip
Applied PCs 74 Fred Eady	Remedy for USB-to-MCU Pain Embedded USB with HIDmaker FS Take the pain out of USB-to-MCU integration with HIDmaker FS. Fred explains how HIDmaker FS can help you write USB applications and concentrate on data rather than the USB protocol. Developing USB code for PIC microcontrollers has never been easier.
80 Michael Dvorsky	Low-Cost Serial Servo Controller When an Illinois-based robot manufacturer mentioned his need for servo controller boards, Michael designed an inexpensive solution. Now you too can generate stable servo pulses for 32 servo channels with this ATmega8-based design. Download: Dvorsky-188.zip
93	Crossword Puzzle
94	Advertiser's Index / April Preview
96 Steve Ciarcia	HTML Priority Interrupt Beware the Trolls

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