[General] RFID help - Thank You!

Sun Jan 6 09:51:12 CST 2013

IDK how lego league does it, but FRC (FIRST Robotics Competition) uses the
word mentor a lot.

On Sun, Jan 6, 2013 at 9:46 AM, Joshua Pritt <ramgarden at gmail.com> wrote:

> That's a very great question!
> We could use the publicity.
> But I wonder if consultants is the right word? One of the greatest uses of
> a makerspace is getting help with a project through the resources of
> knowledge and skill of the members.  I know I've had several projects that
> were easily finished with the help and ideas from the other members. For
> that I'm thankful I found this place and want to pay it forward any chance
> I can.
> Anyone else want to say if it's ok to put us down as helped on a robotics
> project? I will vote yes but don't take my say as final.
> On Jan 6, 2013 8:29 AM, "Faye Lynn Thompson" <watersprite at charter.net>
> wrote:
>
>> May my daughters robotics team list makers local 256 on their display
>> board at competition as "consultants"  ?
>>
>> Faye Lynn Thompson
>>
>> Begin forwarded message:
>>
>> *From: *Faye Lynn Thompson <watersprite at charter.net>
>> *Subject: **Re: [General] RFID help*
>> *Date: *December 31, 2012 7:05:28 PM CST
>> *To: *General discussion about makerslocal <general at lists.makerslocal.org
>> >
>>
>> Thank You!!
>> We've got it working with your help.  Now we're making it "pretty"
>> On Dec 31, 2012, at 12:50 PM, James Fluhler <j.fluhler at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> Also as a side note those ftdi chips are really great and robust; they
>> are absolutely a very simple USB to serial chip and used in many consumer
>> devices.
>>
>> James F.
>>
>> On Dec 28, 2012, at 12:59 PM, Arthur <Arthur at cd-net.net> wrote:
>>
>> Yep, it looks like those use an FTDI chip to look like a good old serial
>> port.  Here's the driver page for them.
>> http://www.ftdichip.com/Drivers/VCP.htm Though, last I checked on most
>> newer Operating Systems (Linux at least) you don't need to install a
>> driver.  It just works.
>>
>> I don't know what controller you're using, but if it's the Lego NXT,
>> here's a python module for that as well:
>> https://code.google.com/p/nxt-python/
>>
>> Since it looks like the tags are preprogrammed with a unique ID, it looks
>> like you don't have to configure them as well.
>>
>> Based on the datasheet<http://www.parallax.com/Portals/0/Downloads/docs/prod/audiovis/28140-28340-RFIDreader-v2.2.pdf>,
>> to activate the reciever you need to set the DTR pin to high on your
>> virtual serial port.  This pySerial command should do the trick "ser.set
>> DTR(True)"
>>
>> Here's a simple pySerial program to test this:
>>
>> import serial
>>>
>>> #This is COM? on Windows systems
>>>
>>> ser = serial.Serial('/dev/ttyS1', 2400, timeout=1)
>>>
>>> #Enable the serial module
>>>
>>> ser.setDTR(True)
>>>
>>> #Do this forever
>>>
>>> while(True):
>>>
>>> #The datasheet says the module returns a 12 byte string
>>>
>>>  #If timeout happens without reading anything, it should print a blank
>>>> line
>>>
>>>  print(str(ser.read(12)))
>>>
>>>
>> Hope this helps,
>> Arthur Moore
>>
>> On Fri, Dec 28, 2012 at 10:20 AM, Faye Lynn Thompson <
>> watersprite at charter.net> wrote:
>> > Wow, y'all are already being so helpful.
>> >
>> > This started as an add on to my daughter's FIRST Lego League robotics
>> team
>> > project.  The team is trying to use RFID to find misplaced items
>> without the
>> > need to replace batteries.  The one we have is too short range, but it
>> is a
>> > good way to learn we hope.
>> > We have this one...
>> >
>> https://www.parallax.com/StoreSearchResults/tabid/768/List/0/SortField/4/ProductID/517/Default.aspx?txtSearch=rfid+usb
>> >
>> > It is built/designed by Grand Idea Studio....
>> > http://www.grandideastudio.com/portfolio/rfid-reader/
>> >
>> > I think the usb port is an add on to the board from FTDI chip
>> > http://www.ftdichip.com/index.html
>> > but I'm not sure which driver to use.
>> >
>> > We are using my early 2009 macbook pro and osx 10.8.2 because it's
>> portable.
>> > We have windows 7 available on other machines and dual boot on the
>> laptop.
>> > Just to make it trickier we'd like to be able to compile the code on a
>> > friends linux machine too.
>> >
>> > I suspect part of our problem is just not being able to make time to
>> get it
>> > our brains wrapped around it.  Now we'd like to have something that
>> looks
>> > nice for the teams display at state competition on Jan 12th in
>> Huntsville.
>> >
>> > Thank You so much already
>> > Faye Lynn
>> >
>> > p.s.  You are all invited to the state competition.  Dates are still a
>> > little fuzzy but it will be in Huntsville.  Jan 12th or 19th at
>> Huntsville
>> > High or Grissom
>> > http://alabamafll.org
>> >
>> >
>> > On Dec 27, 2012, at 11:36 PM, Arthur <Arthur at cd-net.net> wrote:
>> >
>> > That sounds like a fun project.  Could you give me some details about
>> it.
>> > Does the reader use a virtual serial port?  If so, I would suggest
>> pySerial.
>> > The other question is what do you want to do with it?  There are so many
>> > great ideas for RFID.  Which one are you looking at?
>> >
>> > Arthur Moore
>> >
>> > On Friday, December 28, 2012, Faye Lynn Thompson wrote:
>> >>
>> >> My daughter and I are trying  to get a usb RFID reader to work and look
>> >> good doing it.  We can get it to read and display the tags in a
>> monitor /
>> >> shell window.  (ugly but it works)  We'd like to do something in
>> python.  So
>> >> far we have lots of bits and pieces of code, but are having trouble
>> getting
>> >> it all together.
>> >>
>> >> Any advice, urls, etc you can throw our way would be great.
>> >>
>> >> Thanks
>> >> Faye Lynn
>> >> _______________________________________________
>> >> General mailing list
>> >> General at lists.makerslocal.org
>> >> http://lists.makerslocal.org/mailman/listinfo/general
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > --
>> > Sincerely,
>> > Arthur Moore
>> > (256) 277-1001
>> >
>> > _______________________________________________
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>> > General at lists.makerslocal.org
>> > http://lists.makerslocal.org/mailman/listinfo/general
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > _______________________________________________
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>> > General at lists.makerslocal.org
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>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Sincerely,
>> Arthur Moore
>> (256) 277-1001
>>
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