Trigger Lights

While hackers know and love the Raspberry Pi, many don't know of its cheaper cousin, the microcontroller. Unlike a Pi, which can be used more or less like a regular computer, microcontrollers like the Wi-Fi connected ESP8266 require some necessary programming skill to master. ...more

Remember the 1960's American television series Batman, with Adam West as Bruce Wayne? It was waaaaay before my time. The caped crusader that I'm more familiar with is actually this one... When I first heard of Adam West, it was him doing the Batusi on The Simpsons. I had no id ...more

Doorbells are a great idea. They let you know when someone who's not a burglar is trying to enter your house, apartment, or squat. They eliminate the need for lots of noisy yelling and startling door pounding. The one thing doorbells don't do is to let you know when someone f ...more

Whether you subscribe to Apple TV+ or not, the TV app on your iPhone is a great place to watch movies and TV shows. On the surface, it looks like a pretty straightforward app, but hidden features are lurking in the shadows that can enhance how you use it. First, there are the ...more

Gaming on smartphones has grown considerably since the days of The Impossible Game and original Temple Run. Mobile games can be just as in-depth as console and PC video games, but some of those require external controllers for the best gameplay possible. One controller you can ...more

It feels like just yesterday Apple unveiled iOS 13 to the world, introducing game-changing features like system-wide dark mode and enhanced editing tools in Photos. But WWDC 2020 is rapidly approaching, which means iOS 14 is as well. As it turns out, we don't need to wait for ...more

Fireworks are the best part about the Fourth of July and other celebrations, but they can easily cause accidental injuries. It's both safer and more fun to set them off remotely, so we'll hack some standard fireworks with nichrome wire, a relay, and an Arduino to ignite remote ...more

Ever since the announcement of the Razer Phone, a wave of gaming smartphones started to hit the market. With ASUS being such a big name in gaming, it made sense for them to throw their hat in the ring. The result is the ROG Phone. And with this first try, ASUS has topped the r ...more

I'll be the first to admit how horrible my memory is, whether it's remembering to take out the garbage or paying a bill on time. That's why I regularly utilize the stock Reminders app on my iPhone; it's definitely compensated for my memory deficiencies. However, setting a spe ...more

In the pursuit of large displays with thinner bezels, Samsung has sacrificed some components. While the loss of the headphone jack gets all the attention, there are other victims — namely, the notification LED. Once a staple on all Android phones, this small light would blink ...more

These days, using Reddit on your iPhone is just as good, if not better, than Redditing on a desktop browser. While there's an official Reddit app for iOS, there are plenty of third-party clients that have similar features as well as custom perks to enhance the experience. But ...more

While keeping your iPhone out of the bedroom might help to avoid unnecessary distractions before bedtime, it could be better served right by your side to help diagnose sleeping issues you may be experiencing each night. With the Apple Health app, and all of the apps and devic ...more

Less than three weeks after Rovio Entertainment announced the game, the augmented reality adaptation of Angry Birds is now available for the Magic Leap One. Released in conjunction with the L.E.A.P. Conference, Angry Birds FPS: First Person Slingshot is now available as a fre ...more

The long and slow road toward the actual release of the Magic Leap One appears to be accelerating, with a couple of new demonstrations of how the system works revealed in this week's creator's portal updates along with the company's developer documentation. Following the much ...more

Some phones have a feature that turns your screen white for a second when you're taking a selfie in dim lighting. This does a great job of illuminating your face in a pinch, but there are two problems with it: First, not all phones have the feature, and second, it doesn't work ...more

Scientists know that bacteria create their own energy, get nutrients to run their cellular processes, and multiply. But, bacteria haven't been shown to respond to external mechanical stimulation or signals in a way that's similar to how our bodies respond to touch, until now. ...more

Did you know that using your Nexus 5 can deprive you of sleep—and not just because you can't seem to quit playing that addicting game or watching Netflix videos? Recent studies have shown that exposure to blue light, particularly during night hours, can disrupt circadian rhyt ...more

The outstretched arm, the perfectly positioned angle, the shot and the subsequent array of tinkered saturation, contrast and shadows. In almost every car, changing room, or Starbucks, these string of events happen—you might know it as the selfie. Whether these self-portraits ...more

In light of our recent post, Art Borne From the Barrel of a Gun, here's a thorough guide to building your own bullet capture system via robotics site Glacial Wanderer. Says Hack a Day: "A pair of IR sensors spaced two inches apart can capture and calculate the speed of a pro ...more

If you're doing the same tasks on your Android phone repeatedly each day — like playing a specific playlist at the gym, viewing work documents, or watching your favorite music video — you can save some time by automating your routine, turning each task into a one-tap gesture o ...more

I've been using the Galaxy Note 10+ as my daily driver for a while now. I love it, but as with any phone, it loses its pizzazz after a while. But since it's an Android phone, there's always a way to add fresh features and functionality to the UI. The five customization ideas ...more

Though many were hoping for it, a notification indicator around the Galaxy S10's front camera punch hole never came to fruition. Since then, we've been finding other uses for the camera cutout, from turning it into a circular battery meter to using creative wallpapers. Thankfu ...more

For those who thought the action in Pokémon Go was a bit too pedestrian, Father.io wants to recruit you for a multi-player, first-person shooter that unfolds on the streets of your own city. Through a mobile app, available now on the App Store and Google Play, and a pocket-si ...more

The world around us keeps getting smarter. Not only do we have advanced AI services like the Google Assistant, but now we've got the Internet of Things connecting physical objects to the digital world. It's amazing when you think about it, but the real sci-fi stuff starts to h ...more

Bioluminescence — the ability of an organism to produce and emit light — is nature's light show. Plants, insects, fish, and bacteria do it, and scientists understand how. Until now, though, we didn't know how fungi glow. Now, thanks to research led by Zinaida Kaskova in the I ...more

Google Assistant just got a lot more powerful thanks to IFTTT. The automation platform, whose name stands for If This, Then That, connects your favorite online services and smart devices to one another, allowing for a seamless experience with many different gadgets—and Google ...more

One of the latest home-improvement gadgets out there today, smart lighting, has become more popular as prices come down. That being said, its still quite a penny to shell out. In this article, I'll go through a few of the top products out there today, including the Philips Hue ...more

WonderHowTo is a how-to website made up of niche communities called Worlds, with topics ranging from Minecraft to science experiments to Scrabble and everything in-between. Check in every Wednesday evening for a roundup of user-run activities and how-to projects from the commu ...more

Apple's bringing big changes to your iPhone's lock screen in iOS 16, and one of those changes lets you pick an always-updating wallpaper for your local weather conditions. If you don't want to wait until the fall for the stable iOS 16 version and don't want to install any iOS ...more

The book is almost closed on 2019, but Magic Leap has one more gift to offer its users before the new decade arrives. Now appearing in the Magic Leap "Concepts" section of the app store is an experience called Music Box that brings an immersive caroler to anyone using the aug ...more

Apple's Reminders app is essential for those of us with a forgetful memory. But a standard Reminders entry isn't foolproof. They aren't great if you need to do something right when you get somewhere, since it can be tricky to set a specific time for that reminder. That's why A ...more

Lots of Google apps are getting dark mode. Google Drive has had it on Android 10 for a few months. But it hasn't been accessible to all Android users until now. With the latest update, there's a manual dark mode switch you can turn on regardless of what OS version you have. D ...more

Thanks to its advanced cameras, the Galaxy S9 can capture videos at an astonishing 960 frames per second (fps). To put it in perspective, you now have you the ability to record the world around you in ways that previously required expensive professional camera equipment. And t ...more

For people that like to get things done, Android's home screen widgets are almost indispensable. Rather than packing your launcher with a bunch of icons, you can utilize widgets to get quick information in a beautiful package or provide one-tap access to a particular functiona ...more

This is evil and it destroys people. Let's just get that out of the way. Nonetheless, suppose you need to make someone distrust their own memory and perception of reality. Suppose you want someone to believe in you more than they believe in themselves. Regardless of your mali ...more

Small containers are useful for many things. They're good for storing snacks if you have children, as well as holding coins or odds and ends. But those regular store-bought containers are lame—who wants to keep their stuff in a Tupperware dish or old butter container? If you' ...more

Apple just seeded developers and public beta testers the GM (golden master) for iOS 14 on Tuesday, Sept 15. The update (18A373) comes just after Apple's "Time Flies" event, and six days after Apple released iOS 14 beta 8 for both developers and public testers. Apple released ...more

Every year, Apple releases a new version of iOS. Each iteration promises new features to make using your iPhone that much better. This year, iOS 13 introduces over 200 new features and changes, including system-wide Dark Mode for the first time on iPhone. That said, you might ...more

When you can't reach your iPhone or don't have it on you, how do you get help from emergency services? Unless you have one of those life-alert mobile triggers, someone nearby, or some amazing telepathy skills, hope might be the only answer — unless you wear an Apple Watch, tha ...more

Have you been noticing SpaceX and its launches lately? Ever imagined how it would feel to launch your own rocket into the sky? Well, imagine no longer! In this tutorial, you'll learn how to make a simple augmented reality app for iPads and iPhones by using ARKit. Specifically ...more

On April 7, 2017, residents in Dallas, Texas, woke to the sound of emergency sirens blaring all over the city. No one could shut them off, and after repeated efforts to contain the situation, the city had to shut down the entire system. While the media reported a sophisticated ...more

After months of leaks and rumors, Google has finally unveiled the Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL. If there were such a thing, the Pixel would be the one "true" Android flagship — so even if you don't plan on buying a Pixel 2, you'll want you learn more about this milestone device. La ...more

Facebook will let you do pretty much anything via a text message, but unless you still have a flip phone, it's more of a novelty than actually useful. However, one thing that would be useful for smartphones is being able to update your status via a phone call, particularly wh ...more

A typical resistance spot welder can range in price from about $200-$800, but with a little resourcefulness and a bit of free time, you can make one like this for about $10 or less. Before starting on this project, there are a couple of videos you should check out, because yo ...more

Fresh off of shipping version 2019.1 in April, Unity has already dropped the beta of 2019.2, and it has a bunch of new AR Foundation toys to test. Among the new capabilities supported by Unity's cross-platform mobile AR framework include face tracking and 2D image tracking, m ...more

Owners of Google Pixel devices now have a plethora of imaginary friends to play with thanks to the Playground augmented reality app. The app, a rebrand of the AR Stickers app, launched as an exclusive app for the Google Pixel 3 and 3XL handsets in October. On Wednesday, Googl ...more

The Pixel 3 runs stock Android, so you might think that since you've used an Android device before, you should know your way around the new phone by default. But Google has actually added several great Pixel-exclusive software features to its flagships, and not all of them are ...more

Another entrant into the do-it-yourself AR content creation market has emerged, as Zappar has updated its ZapWorks Studio software to include features for development newbies. Available now, ZapWorks Studio 5 brings a new feature called Actions that enables users to build AR ...more

Surveillance is always a useful tool in a hacker's arsenal, whether deployed offensively or defensively. Watching targets yourself isn't always practical, and traditional surveillance camera systems can be costly, lacking in capabilities, or both. Today, we will use motionEyeO ...more

What happens when a entrepeneur/theme park creator and special effects artist/magician team up? You get a team crazy enough to create the first true virtual reality theme park (sorry, Six Flags). They only have a single experience so far, but it's already taken a giant leap be ...more

Uninstalling programs in Windows is not the nicest procedure. Some programs bundle a nice uninstaller with them which helps to ease the process. Other programs, mainly those that utilize the Windows Installer technology, begin the uninstall process right away. This can potenti ...more

Let's just say it's been a pretty bad year for spies and government agencies and an even worse one for the privacy of U.S. citizens. Edward Snowden blew the lid off the NSA's spy program, and the FBI was recently discovered to have the ability to access your webcam any time th ...more

We see Steampunk props all the time and wonder where the maker found all their pieces. In fact, for some people it's almost like a game to examine each prop and see if they can name all of the original parts. However, for a newcomer (or a novice at prop-making), it may be rea ...more

You can take a photo on your iPhone with just one tap or press, but you can also use the Camera app hands-free for more impressive images. Doing so lets you take more detailed selfies, include your whole group in the frame, or get steadier results in Night mode — and it's easy ...more

Apple's iOS 14 is here. With it, you'll see over 200 new features and changes hit your iPhone, including home screen widgets, inline replies in Messages, and cycling routes in Maps. Here's how you can get your hands on the brand new update. Apple released iOS 14 to compatible ...more

When Apple acquired the popular Workflow app in 2017, many were worried that it would either get replaced with something much worse, or just disappear entirely. Thankfully, Apple put these concerns to rest with the launch of Shortcuts. In iOS 13, Shortcuts is becoming more pow ...more

It's finally out. After months of testing, iOS 13 is available to install on your iPhone, which means over 200+ new features you can use right now. The update, released on Sept. 19, can be installed over the air or from a restore image using iTunes in macOS Mojave and older or ...more

Your Apple Watch sends you notifications from friends, family, and the apps that are important to you. Occasionally, however, the watch may scare the heck out of you with a notification warning of an abnormal, elevated heart rate. If you have no history of heart conditions, th ...more

Hackers and makers are often grouped under the same label. While hackers draw on computer science skills to write programs and find bugs, makers use electrical engineering to create hardware prototypes from microprocessor boards like the Arduino. We'll exercise both sets of sk ...more

The new Google Assistant is only officially available on three platforms—newer Android phones (Pixels and those running Marshmallow and Nougat), the Google Allo app, and Google Home. However, most of the Assistant's basic functionality is also bundled into the Google app for A ...more