Hi Gang,
I’ve spent most of my professional career in finance, but a few years ago I became hooked on the concept of connecting electronic devices to the Internet. So far, I’ve been building through-hole devices with Fritzing. I’m here now to upgrade my skills and make the transition to KiCad.
Hi Larry!
Welcome to the forum! What sort of projects are you interested in?
Hey Larry! Welcome to the forum, excited to continue working with you here!
Larry has done some excellent Linux based control work, as well as UI / UX work, with me in the past. He has been looking to dig into more of the low level hardware, which I heartily encouraged!
Hi guys!
OK, let’s see where this journey takes me.
Ian, the closest thing I have to a ‘pet project’ is an Internet-connected garden light controller. The first version was on breadboard. I’m currently iterating on a through-hole version, designed with Fritzing. Maybe before this is all over, I can get to SMT designed with KiCad.
Sounds good! I was pleasantly surprised at how non-painful SMD soldering turned out to be (assuming you use reasonably sized parts and are patient with yourself to start with). There are a few kits out there to get you started if you want something with low ego investment (somehow doing a bad job of soldering a board I designed myself feels worse than making a mess of a kit!). I got one of these from Wayne and Layne: https://store.wayneandlayne.com/products/smt-blinky-pov-kit.html