Hacklab is a big part of the Maker Festival Satellite Events this year – we’ve got EIGHT workshop/events all queued up for the Month of Making (June 15th – July 17th)! I’m especially excited about the Soldering Workshop – Component Art and the Sewing 101: DIY button up shirt workshops, but there is something for everyone! We’ll also be exhibiting at Maker Festival July 9th & 10th, at the Toronto Reference Library. Come check out our booth!

Awh… The joy of a hacker space. All the tools to build this lovely PiDP-8/I replica of the PDP-8/I kit from Oscar Vermeulen.

The hacklab hackaday bring your hack meetup, back for the second year. Get your (free) tickets here:
https://hacklabhackaday2.eventbrite.ca
Hacklab.TO and Hackaday are hosting a Bring A Hack meetup on April 20th 2016! Doors 7pm, talks start 8pm. Party till late.

We’ll have drinks, snacks, hacks and swag. It’s a Bring A Hack style meetup, where you bring the project you’re working on and show it off to enthusiastic supporters.

There will also be lightning talks, which are short talks about projects or ideas you’re working on.

Sophi from Hackaday will be in town to talk about the Hackaday Prize, the engineering competition with $300,000 in cash prizes (you read that correctly!). http://hackaday.io/prize

Want to get on the talks list? Let us know! (contact sophikravitz at hackaday.com)

NOTE: as with last year, we expect overwhelming demand. Seats will go fast, grab them while you can. Then we’ve got some standing room only in the back/side of the room. If you’re really interested in checking out hacklab, we also offer an Open House every Tuesday 6pm till late, so feel free to drop by.

Our upcoming 100 Member Party is THIS FRIDAY, March 11th, starting at 6pm till late. Because of its proximity to Pi Day (March 14 = 3.14) I’ve decided to combine the parties, so it will also be our annual Pi Day Party! For those who don’t know, Pi Day is an annual celebration which involves consuming a LOT of pie!

It will be free to attend, and everyone is welcome – you do not have to be a member of hacklab to come and join the fun. Please tell all your friends.

If you’d like to consume some of the pie, we ask only that you either bring a pie (sweet, savory, pizza, whatever, all kinds of pie are awesome!), or donate suggested $5 (PWYC) to hacklab. This ensures we’ll have enough pie for everyone.

Hope to see you all on Friday!

At the Hacklab, to save power, we needed a way to turn off devices when nobody was at the Lab.  Rather than buy expensive Insteon or Z-Wave modules, Hacklab member Av (that’s me!) reverse-engineered the radio protocol on these super cheap ($8 each) controllable outlet modules.

For a total cost of $47, you can now control 5 or more outlets via Wifi.  All that’s needed is an ESP8266 and a 433Mhz transmitter module.  No soldering or electronics is required, it’s just three wires!

Check out the rest of the project with source code on Av’s Site.

We’ll be having our next Junk Independence Day at the Hacklab this coming Sunday February 21st from 2pm-7pm (or later). Bring your e-waste or other electronics you want to get rid of, root around in other people e-waste, and walk home with new treasure. On previous Junk Independence Days people have gone home with wonderful treasures like a 1TB HD, an iPod touch, a decent desktop computer, a classic Macintosh, and lots of random electronic bits for hacking on. Come with your e-waste and have some fun socializing with other hackers!
Anything left at the end will be picked up on Monday February 22nd and responsibly recycled by Revolution Recycling, who has been participating in our Junk Independence Days since the first one. Thanks Revolution!

Hacklab member Av has been busy working on this ridiculously huge RGB LED Pixel display.  There is still much to be done, but here are some work-in-progress photos.  The project consists of 32 strips, each with 150 WS2812 RGB addressable LEDs.  That’s 4,800 pixels!

Hacklab is proud to be hosting the official launch party for the new Toronto Studio Commons!

“Toronto Studio Commons is a diverse group of independent artist studios, workshops and collaborative spaces, sharing a common goal in promoting artistic and creative expression in our city. Founded by a new generation of artists and entrepreneurs, TSC represents a wide range of operating structures, such as open studios, galleries and/or shared spaces.
Acting as an inclusive platform and forum that supports creativity in any medium, TSC seeks to empower artists and creatives through mentorship and education, providing the right tools, experience and environments for success. With our varied spaces and expertise, we promote collaboration among artists and studios across any form of media to open new avenues of creative expression.”

The launch party will be at hacklab, 1266 Queen Street West #6, on Friday November 20th, from 8-11pm. There will be snacks and reps from each of the various spaces on hand to talk about what they do. VR demo and soldering from hacklab :-)

In this workshop, Rob and Alex demonstrate how to configure, flash, and use the ESP-8266 Wifi module.  Learn how to do cool things with LUA and NodeMCU, and check out some more complex things you can do with custom firmware.

Easily connect your plant water sensor, refrigerator, coffee machine, shoes, or cat to the internet, thanks to the magic of the Internet of Things!

Plug-and-play USB-enabled ESP modules will be available at cost for $8 to the first 13 attendees (as that’s how many we have).

When: Monday, Nov 9th, at 7:00 PM
Where: Hacklab Classroom

YOU WILL REQUIRE: A laptop and $8 to buy a module.

Please RSVP on EventBrite:

http://www.eventbrite.com/e/building-the-internet-of-things-on-the-cheap-tickets-19207453009

Want to learn the basics of control voltages and analog music synthesis? Your hosts Andrew Kilpatrick and David Waldman of Kilpatrick Audio will give a musical and technical tour. Andrew’s PHENOL synths will be there for you to try. Bring a pair of headphones.

When: November 2, 2015 at 1900h
Where: Hacklab Classroom
Why: Because synths are awesome!

Please RSVP if you will be attending:

https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/intro-to-analog-synths-tickets-19081611614