Confreaks

RoR makes an excellent framework for off-the-beaten-path type of projects, like hacking Roombas and other robots. In this presentation, I'll demonstrate how our soon to be robot overlords will be happy when we gift them with RoR and a connection to the internet. The presentation will include working examples and demonstrations of:

communicating with an Arduino chip via Ruby tethered serial and wireless bluetooth control of a Roomba via Ruby and Arduino two-way communication with our robot friends over the web using Ruby on Rails and popular web services useful applications of robots controlled over the web 3 RoRoR pitfalls to watch-out for live performance of "Chiron Beta Prime" by Jonathan Coulton* The presentation will close with an argument for why hacking on fun, often eccentric, projects in your spare time is essential for staying motivated, habitual improvement, and tangential learning -- i.e., being a real pragmatic programmer.

*not included, perhaps