User:Asj
| Asj | |
|---|---|
| |
| Name | Aaron Jackson |
| Model | Human with upgrades |
| Website | aaronsplace.co.uk |
| Mastodon | @asj@hachyderm.io |
| Discord | asjackson |
| Callsign | M6PIU |
Unlikely to keep this updated (it's a wiki after all). Website is aaronsplace.co.uk
I like making things in general - especially if I can go from having an idea to a finished "thing" in one evening.
Always happy to chat on Discord or Liber.Chat (IRC) with other members - I'm asjackson on both
Timeline
- Born
- School school school
- Worked as a PHP developer for six months before realising it was boring
- Went to Bangor Uni to study computer science
- Went to Uni of Notts to study PhD in computer science https://aaronsplace.co.uk/research.html
- Got bored of trying to publish in a field as crowded as AI/ML, got bored of working on application based research rather than something useful, started doing research computing support at Dundee University for a health informatics group.
- What happens next???
Interests
- Fixing and Poking PDP-11s and VAXen.
- Electronics - I like analogue stuff but always need to learn more.
- Napping with my cats.
- Amateur Radio, particularly AX.25 packet stuff
- Cycling, although I've definitely lost a lot of fitness over the past few years and now struggle to motivate myself to go on long rides
Projects
While finding photos of things I've built, I realised I mostly use the space to fix things. Also I have a lot of projects which have stalled. Hopefully the list will grow eventually. 😅
LED Dot-Matrix Clock in laser cut case, NodeMCU behind the scenes
Nixie clock, laser cut case, machined brass feet
Laser cut ear plug storage
Bodge fix VAX 4000 PSU, new +/- 12v module
DEC RL02 Spindle ground
DEC RL02 Spindle bearings replacement
Replacement PDP-11 BA11 backplate
Tektronix 604 refurbishment and new screen protector
Railway Departure Board
Departure Board Arduino Shield
Pager Transmitter for Nottinghack
- 2024 Pager Transmitter MB7PNH
- 2024 A POCSAG Pager transmitter using an Adafruit Feather LoRa board
- 2024 Train Station Display, external blog post
- 2023 A very stylish nixie clock
- 2023 The discord bot for Nottingham Hackspace
- 2023 ESPhome module for the Interstate75 RGB LED panel driver board
- 2023 A GitHub action pipeline for automatically building 2.11BSD releases
- 2023 An LED dot matrix clock, and an RFID powered catflap
- 2023 Bodge fix of a VAX4000 power supply
- 2022 giving a cheap doorbell WiFi powers
- 2022 ESPhome support for the AdaFruit MagTag e-ink display. In theory should do grayscale but I only got b/w working
- 2021 a GPIB driver for 2.11BSD running on a PDP-11
- 2022 a ridiculous deep drive into the innerworkings of a 10MB harddrive from the 1970s
- 2019 Leak Stereo 20 tube amplifier repair and restoration
- 2020 A 12AX7 preamp
- 2019 bleh - my phd thesis
- 2018 A lisp interpretter 2.11BSD written in K&R C
- 2018 a quick and dirty GPIB adapter based on arduino
Quite fun digging those out and reminding myself what I've been up to over the past few years.
Things I want to learn about
- Amaranth HDL for programming FPGA, had some success with the built in simulator, waiting for real fpga to arrive. https://amaranth-lang.org/docs/amaranth/latest/
- Screen printing (mainly the stencil making part)
- Risograph
- CAD so I can use the CNC router better
KiCAD because I currently wirewrap everything