I've put together a google groups mailing list to talk about development of open source health hardware/software and drivers for consumer health equipment. It's at
https://groups.google.com/group/openyou/
Also, we've got an IRC channel on Freenode, #openyou. If you don't have an irc client currently, you can use freenode's web client to get there for now.
They say he who dies with the most maintainerships... dies very tired.
The emokit project, started by Daeken, aims to provide a free driver to access raw data coming from the Emotiv EPOC headset. However, he's been really busy being awesome elsewhere lately, so after picking up the decode key for the special pre-release unit, writing a C implementation of the library, and fielding some support emails, I (Kyle) have finally just gone ahead and taken the lead maintainer role on the project.
Many thanks go to Daeken for the initial work on getting the library and community together, and hopefully he'll come back to visit at some point.
The new main repo is at
http://www.github.com/qdot/emokit
Next big steps for the project are:
I also develop the np_epoc external for Max/Pd. I expect that I'll be updating the external along with anything we get done with the headset itself, so keep an eye on that on my personal externals page.
I've spent the past couple of weeks working on libfitbit, library that provides hardware access to the fitbit health device. The current goal of this library is to provide a mechanism to build an open source data aggregation client, meaning linux-using fitbit owners can finally sync their hardware with the website.
For those that aren't familiar, the fitbit is a clip-on accelerometer that features a nice little OLED screen and wireless data synchronization capabilities via ANT hardware.
Currently, libfitbit is written in python, and implements most of the fetching and uploading protocol of the fitbit, enough that web synchronization via linux has happened successfully (minus a couple of commands from the server that I can't seem to send to the device correctly). Once all commands are sending correctly, the next goal is a C version of the library, as well as some demo applications of "real-time" access, such as a smart "get up a move" detector (that warns you when you've been sitting for more than a certain period of time, but also takes into account when you've moved by reading the fitbit). I will also probably split out the ANT python protocol library into its own repository, since it'll be handy in other projects.
fitbit themselves have released their own API, but this is only for accessing their web services, and does not cover actual hardware access. However, the web API and libfitbit could easily be used together to create new and interesting interfaces combining the hardware and fitbit's data services.
One of the other main goals behind this is to create a centralized ANT sync dongle so that multiple devices can sync to a single USB dongle. I'm honestly not sure if this is possible (my knowledge of the RF side of ANT is still cursory at best), but I don't see why not, and it's far better than having to keep track of a ton of different dongles across multiple machines.
Earlier this week, I was invited to check out an MRI as it was being dismantled for replacement of the gradient coil. It's rare to see an MRI in this state outside of the factory, so I crutched myself down to the UCSF Neuroimaging Lab to check it out.
The gradient coil itself is a big cylinder of wire that weighs about 3000 pounds. It's an integral part of providing positioning of signals coming from whatever is being scanned (which, in this case, is usually brains.)
Replacing it is not exactly a simple task. The coil had to be rolled along a large metal bar and lined up precisely with the opening of the MRI, as it is seated very tightly. Here's video of the installation:
There were many other interesting pieces of hardware around the lab. Dr. Adam Gazzaley is currently doing a study on the brain and multitasking via video games, and needs to have a rig capable of playing video games in the room with the MRI. As there's a 3 tesla sitting in the middle of the room while the games are being played, this means convention hardware using magnetic materials is right out. This means there's specially built hardware all around, including specially built, heavily shielded LCD monitors using no magnetic materials.
There's more photos of the trip at:
Thanks to Dr. Gazzaley and Dr. Stables for inviting me to the lab and showing me around!
After a long weekend of work, I believe I've finally got the basic layout of the site ready to go. There's still quite a bit of work to do on the library and application tables, as well as the question of whether or not those should just be wiki pages instead of centrally administrated, but for now, at least things are together.
Copyright 2011-2018 Kyle Machulis - Logo by Counter-Productive Productions
