Introduction to Python

Python is a widely used general-purpose, high-level programming language.Its syntax allows programmers to express concepts in fewer lines of code than would be possible in languages such as C. Like other dynamic languages, Python is often used as a scripting language, but is also used in a wide range of non-scripting contexts.

Python interpreters are available for many operating systems.

CPython, the reference implementation of Python, is free and open source software.

Python's statements include (among others):

The if statement, which conditionally executes a block of code, along with else and elif (a contraction of else-if).

The for statement, which iterates over an iterable object, capturing each element to a local variable for use by the attached block.

The while statement, which executes a block of code as long as its condition is true.

The try statement, which allows exceptions raised in its attached code block to be caught and handled by except clauses; it also ensures that clean-up code in a finally block will always be run regardless of how the block exits.

The class statement, which executes a block of code and attaches its local namespace to a class, for use in object-oriented programming.

The def statement, which defines a function or method.

The with statement (from Python 2.5), which encloses a code block within a context manager (for example, acquiring a lock before the block of code is run and releasing the lock afterwards, or opening a file and then closing it), allowing RAII-like behavior.

The pass statement, which serves as a NOP. It is syntactically needed to create an empty code block.

The assert statement, used during debugging to check for conditions that ought to apply.

The yield statement, which returns a value from a generator function. From Python 2.5, yield is also an operator. This form is used to implement coroutines.

The import statement, which is used to import modules whose functions or variables can be used in the current program.

Installing a Python on Linux : Go

Using Python on Linux:

To enter conversational mode on a Linux system, type this command:

python

Type Control-D to terminate the session.

If you write a Python script named filename.py, you can execute it using the command

python filename.py

Under Unix, you can also make a script self-executing by placing this line at the top:

#!/usr/bin/env python

You must also tell Linux that the file is executable by using the command “chmod +x filename”. For example, if your script is called hello.py, you would type this command:

chmod +x hello.py

For More Details Go to :
Python Quick Reference
Getting Started with Python

What is Circuit Design : In Steps

The process of circuit design can cover systems ranging from national power grids all the way down to the individual transistors within an integrated circuit.

circuit design" often refers to the step of the design cycle which outputs the schematics of the integrated circuit. Typically this is the step between logic design and physical design.

For simple circuits the design process can often be done by one person without needing a planed or structured design process, but for more complex designs, teams of designers following a systematic approach with intelligently guided computer simulation are becoming increasingly common.

As circuit design is the process of working out the physical form that an electronic circuit will take, the result of the circuit design process is the instructions on how to construct the physical electronic circuit.

This will normally take the form of blueprints describing the size, shape, connectors, etc in use, and artwork or CAM file for manufacturing a printed circuit board or Integrated circuit.

• sometimes, writing the requirement specification after liaising with the customer
• writing a technical proposal to meet the requirements of the customer specification
• synthesising on paper a schematic circuit diagram, an abstract electrical or electronic circuit that will meet the specifications
• calculating the component values to meet the operating specifications under specified conditions
• performing simulations to verify the correctness of the design
• building a breadboard or other prototype version of the design and testing against specification
• making any alterations to the circuit to achieve compliance
• choosing a method of construction as well as all the parts and materials to be used
• presenting component and layout information to draughtspersons, and layout and mechanical engineers, for prototype production
• testing or type-testing a number of prototypes to ensure compliance with customer requirements
• signing and approving the final manufacturing drawings
• post-design services (obsolescence of components etc.)

The design process involves moving from the specification at the start, to a plan that contains all the information needed to be physically constructed at the end, this normally happens by passing through a number of stages, although in very simple circuit it may be done in a single step.The process normally begins with the conversion of the specification into a block diagram of the various functions that the circuit must perform, at this stage the contents of each block are not considered, only what each block must do, this is sometimes referred to as a "black box" design. This approach allows the possibly very complicated task to be broken into smaller tasks which may either by tackled in sequence or divided amongst members of a design team.

Each block is then considered in more detail, still at an abstract stage, but with a lot more focus on the details of the electrical functions to be provided. At this or later stages it is common to require a large amount of research or mathematical modeling into what is and is not feasible to achieve.The results of this research may be fed back into earlier stages of the design process, for example if it turns out one of the blocks cannot be designed within the parameters set for it, it may be necessary to alter other blocks instead. At this point it is also common to start considering both how to demonstrate that the design does meet the specifications, and how it is to be tested ( which can includeself diagnostic tools ).

Finally the individual circuit components are chosen to carry out each function in the overall design, at this stage the physical layout and electrical connections of each component are also decided, this layout commonly taking the form of artwork for the production of a printed circuit board or Integrated circuit. This stage is typically extremely time consuming because of the vast array of choices available. A practical constraint on the design at this stage is that of standardization, while a certain value of component may be calculated for use in some location in a circuit, if that value cannot be purchased from a supplier, then the problem has still not been solved. To avoid this a certain amount of 'catalog engineering' can be applied to solve the more mundane tasks within an overall design.

Once a circuit has been designed, it must be both verified and tested. Verification is the process of going through each stage of a design and ensuring that it will do what the specification requires it to do. This is frequently a highly mathematical process and can involve large-scale computer simulations of the design. In any complicated design it is very likely that problems will be found at this stage and may involve a large amount of the design work be redone in order to fix them.

Testing is the real-world counterpart to verification, testing involves physically building at least a prototype of the design and then (in combination with the test procedures in the specification or added to it) checking the circuit really does do what it was designed to.

Prototype Hydrogen Storage Tank Maintains Extended Thermal Endurance

A cryogenic pressure vessel developed and installed in an experimental hybrid vehicle by a Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory research team can hold liquid hydrogen for six days without venting any of the fuel. Unlike conventional liquid hydrogen (LH₂)tanks in prototype cars, the LLNL pressure vessel was parked for six days without venting evaporated hydrogen vapor.

The LLNL development has significantly increased the amount of time it takes to start releasing hydrogen during periods of long-term parking, as compared to today’s liquid hydrogen tanks capable of holding hydrogen for merely two to four days.

LH₂ tanks hold super-cold liquid hydrogen at around -420 Fahrenheit. Like water boiling in a tea kettle, pressure builds as heat from the environment warms the hydrogen inside. Current automotive LH2 tanks must vent evaporated hydrogen vapor after being parked three to four days, even when using the best thermal insulation available (200 times less conductive than Styrofoam insulation).

In recent testing of its prototype hydrogen tank onboard a liquid hydrogen (LH₂) powered hybrid, LLNL’s tank demonstrated a thermal endurance of six days and the potential for as much as 15 days, helping resolve a key challenge facing LH₂ automobiles.

Today’s automotive LH₂ tanks operate at low pressure (2-10 atmospheres). The LLNL cryogenic capable pressure vessel is much stronger, and can operate at hydrogen pressures of up to 350 atmospheres (similar to scuba tanks), holding the hydrogen even as the pressure increases due to heat transfer from the environment. This high-pressure capability also means that a vehicle’s thermal endurance improves as the tank is emptied, and is able to hold hydrogen fuel indefinitely when it is about one-third full.

Last year, the LLNL experimental hybrid vehicle demonstrated the longest driving distance on a single tank of hydrogen (650 miles). The recent thermal endurance experiments validate the key benefit of cryogenic pressure vessels: They deliver the high density of liquid hydrogen storage without the evaporative losses. These two advantages make LH2 vehicles far more practical in the search for a replacement to today’s gasoline-powered automobiles.

The Livermore work, sponsored by the Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, is part of DOE’s National Hydrogen Storage Project to demonstrate advanced hydrogen-storage materials and designs. The project is a component of President George W. Bush’s Hydrogen Fuel Initiative launched in 2003 as well as his DOE Advanced Energy Initiative of 2006.

Hydrogen Power in Real Life: Clean and Energy Efficient

Since 2009, a hydrogen powered street cleaning vehicle has been undergoing testing on the streets of Basel. The project is intended to take hydrogen drives out of the laboratory and onto the streets in order to gain experience on using them under practical conditions. The result of the pilot trial: hydrogen as a fuel for municipal utility vehicles saves energy, is environmentally friendly and is technically feasible. In order to make it cost-effective, however, the prices of fuel cells, pressurized storage tanks and electric drives must all drop significantly.

To develop a prototype and then test it right away under everyday conditions of use is not an easy undertaking, and setbacks are practically preprogrammed. The hydrogen powered street cleaning vehicle, which took about 18 months to develop and began trials in Basel in 2009, is no exception. "It became clear relatively quickly that the fuel cell system, which had been developed as a one-of specially for the project, was not yet ready for use in a real-life setting," explains project leader Christian Bach, head of Empa's Internal Combustion Engines Laboratory. "On top of that, the various safety systems kept interfering with each other and bringing everything to a halt."

But because the vehicle achieved its targets both in terms of energy consumption and performance, the project team -- which, in addition to researchers from Empa and the Paul Scherrer Institute (PSI), also included the vehicle manufacturer Bucher Schoerling, the electric drive specialist Brusa, the hydrogen manufacturer Messer Schweiz, and the city of Basel Environment and Energy Department as well as the city's cleaning services -- decided to replace the fuel cell system initially used with another more mature product, and also to implement a single centralized safety module. The "Fuel Cell System Mk 2" has now been in operation since the summer of last year and has proven to be far more robust: only once has it been necessary to take the vehicle out of service, because of a defective water pump.

But one problem rarely comes alone and sure enough the voltage converter between the fuel cell system and the battery died, then the sensing system for the electric motor drive as well as two cooling water pumps had to be replaced shortly after the vehicle was initially repaired. All these components were, it goes without saying, tailor-made for the vehicle and therefore had appropriately long delivery times. Despite these setbacks, however, for the past three months the vehicle has been running so reliably that the city cleaning services are able to use it on an everyday basis as they would a "normal" vehicle.

Lessons learned from the experience in Basel

The test phase in Basel showed that fuel cells are ready for use under everyday conditions, also -- perhaps particularly -- in niche applications such as municipal utility vehicles. Their use allows the operator to save a considerable amount of energy, since the vehicle consumes less than half the fuel of its contemporaries. In figures: instead of 5 to 5.5 liters of diesel per hour (equivalent to an energy consumption of 180-200 MJ per hour) the hydrogen powered vehicle needs only 0.3 to 0.6 kg of fuel per hour (that is, 40-80 MJ per hour). And in terms of CO₂ emissions, too, the new vehicle performs about 40% better than a diesel powered equivalent, even when the hydrogen is produced by the steam reforming of natural gas using fossil fuels. If the hydrogen was produced using energy from renewable sources then the CO₂ reduction would be even greater.

During use the novel vehicle has proven to be user-friendly and safe. Refueling was done by the drivers themselves at a mobile, easy-to-use hydrogen fuel station. The refueling stations and garages where the vehicles are parked are fitted with a hydrogen monitoring system, but since it has been in use there has not been a single problem caused by hydrogen leaks. An additional advantage is the fact that the fuel cell powered vehicle is much quieter than a diesel vehicle, both when driving to the area to be cleaned as well as during cleaning itself, even when the suction system and brushes are operating. This leads to a noticeable reduction in noise, particularly for the drivers.

The only disadvantage is that on cold days the waste heat from the fuel cell and the electric motor are not sufficient to adequately warm the driver's cabin -- a typical weakness of electrical drives. To counter this, the driver's seat was fitted with a heater unit for use on cold days.

Around the middle of March 2012 the test phase in Basel will draw to an end and the vehicle will be taken to St Gallen for further practical trials. Now that the teething problems have been overcome, the vehicle will undergo further testing in everyday situations in order to gain more operating experience and to allow the aging behavior of the various components used in the vehicle to be studied.

Currently a vehicle of this kind is about three times as expensive as a conventional one. On the other hand, the costs of fuel cell systems alone have, over the past few years, dropped by a factor of ten, and the end of this trend is not yet in sight.

Source : ScienceDaily

Can an electric vehicle be extremely light and safe at the same time?

Researchers working on the Visio.M project aim to show that the answer is yes. Scientists as well engineers from Germany's leading technology companies have teamed up to develop a Visionary Mobility concept car to meet tomorrow's electromobility needs. They have chosen a sturdy monocoque body, state-of-the-art carbon fiber materials and a lightweight engine and transmission system. A Visio.M research prototype has already successfully negotiated drive and chassis tests.

Up to now, it has been a case of "either/or." On the one hand, we have the typical ultra-compact, lightweight electric car, where designers have had to compromise on safety. With larger e-cars on the other hand, the heavier frames and crumple zones come at the expense of battery range. But now researchers as well as engineers from some of Germany's top technology firms are looking to create the best of both worlds. The aim of the Visio.M project is to develop a mobility concept for an efficient electric vehicle, making the design as light as possible while still delivering the best possible safety protection.

The Visio.M engineers decided in favor of an innovative monocoque body structure. Typically used in racing cars, a monocoque chassis combined with lightweight materials enables good stability while keeping overall weight to a minimum.

Innovative materials

The developers are also breaking new ground in their choice of ultra-lightweight materials for the structure: The passenger compartment will be made of carbon-fiber-reinforced plastic. Composite materials of this type are already used in the manufacture of aircraft and luxury sports cars. The downside is that they are extremely complex to produce and expensive as a result. So the Visio.M engineers intend to investigate the feasibility of carbon fiber materials in ultra-compact cars suitable for series production.

For the drive system, too, the Visio.M developers are looking to keep weight to an absolute minimum. The e-car they are designing will have an efficient and compact asynchronous electric engine. The transmission system will incorporate very light gears resting on hollow shafts. This would make the gears up to 15 percent lighter than conventional designs.

Safety first

The lightweight design innovations may be impressive, but driver and passenger safety is still the number one priority of the Visio.M project. The sturdy carbon fiber structure will incorporate various dedicated active and passive features addressing the specific safety challenges of an ultra-compact electric car. The ideas being investigated include specially adapted seatbelts as well as other innovative concepts to minimize potential injuries in the event of an accident. By the end of the project, the researchers hope that they will have achieved the maximum possible level of safety.

A research prototype vehicle has already passed some initial chassis tests. The Electronic Stability Program, i.e., the anti-lock braking system and the torque vectoring system, have been put through their paces at a test site near Munich -- marking another successful step in the move to develop a safe electric vehicle.

Source : Sciencedaily

Duty Cycle

A duty cycle is the percent of time that an entity spends in an active state as a fraction of the total time under consideration.

 In an electrical device, a 60% duty cycle means the power is on 60% of the time and off 40% of the time. The "on time" for a 60% duty cycle could be a fraction of a second – or for say, irrigation pumps, days – depending on how long the device's period is. Here one period is the length of time it takes for the device to go through a complete on/off cycle.

Image shows different duty cycles.

In a periodic event, duty cycle is the ratio of the duration of the event to the total period of a signal.

duty cycle 

where

 is the duration that the function is active.

 is the period of the function.

Intersting Electronics Facts

Dear Friends,
I have put the electronics facts at the right sidebar. You can refer these facts any time you want simultaneously reading any post/any page.

Thank you.
Click Here

Google Glass Specifications Announced

Glass can shoot video up to 720p resolution, and features a high resolution display that's equal to "a 25-inch high definition screen from eight feet away."

Google's wearable technology Google Glass will sport a 5-megapixel camera and bone conduction audio, according to the company's support page which lists tech specifications.(Listed Below)

The device supports WiFi and Bluetooth, includes 12 GB of "usable memory" that syncs with Google cloud storage and a battery that runs for "one full day of typical use," reads the specs breakdown.

BATTERY SHOULD LAST "ONE FULL DAY OF TYPICAL USE"

The Internet-connected glasses allow wearers to check messages, take photos or video and surf the Web by using a variety of voice commands. Google has yet to announce when Glass will be available to the general public.

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FACTS : 

There is no need to touch or press any keys, just you have to talk with glass. See Example

Glass is robust, stable and built to fit into your life. But you might break it if you don’t handle it with care. Protect your Glass by using the pouch provided, or another carrying case that you trust to keep Glass safe, dry, and awesome.

It might be harder to hear Glass or use voice input commands in noisy areas, and it might be harder to see the Glass screen in bright sunlight.

Don’t let the Glass device or battery come in contact with liquids. Liquids can get into the electronic components, leading to corrosion.

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IN BRIEF : 

Fit

• Adjustable nosepads and durable frame fits any face.
• Extra nosepads in two sizes.

Display

High resolution display is the equivalent of a 25 inch high definition screen from eight feet away.

Camera

• Photos - 5 MP
• Videos - 720p

Audio

• Bone Conduction Transducer

Connectivity

• Wifi - 802.11b/g
• Bluetooth

Storage

• 12 GB of usable memory, synced with Google cloud storage. 16 GB Flash total.

Battery

One full day of typical use. Some features, like Hangouts and video recording, are more battery intensive.

Charger

• Included Micro USB cable and charger.

While there are thousands of Micro USB chargers out there, Glass is designed and tested with the included charger in mind.

Compatibility

• Any Bluetooth-capable phone.
• The MyGlass companion app requires Android 4.0.3 (Ice Cream Sandwich) or higher. MyGlass enables GPS and SMS messaging.

Image Courtesy: www.techradar.com

Information : www.theverge.com

www.usatoday.com

support.google.com

Testing Your Blown Off Capacitor

Use your multimeter as an ohmmeter to test the capacitor. 

1) Discharge the capacitor by shortening its leads. That is - use a wire and connect the leads of the capacitor together. This will discharge it.

2) Put your multimeter in the high ranges 10K-1M
3) Connect MultiMeter to capacitor leads (observe the polarity if electrolytic). At soon as the leads make contact, the meter will swing near zero. It will then move slowly toward infinity. Finally the meter would come to be infinite ohms because the capacitor is being charged by the battery of the multimeter.

4) If the capacitor is bad, it will go to zero ohms and remain there. This is called a shortened capacitor

5) In the case of an open capacitor there will be no ohmmeter indication.

6) Some capacitors have a low dielectric leakage. You will know this if the ohmmeter comes to rest at a point lower than infinite. Test a known good capacitor of the same type to be sure


Analog Meter : Reverse the leads and look for a major kick in the needle. If the cap charged from the DC voltage induced by the meter, the cap will discharge when the leads are reversed, causing a twitch in the needle.

An LED Clip That Dries Your Clothes!

Tuesday, April 02, 2013:  Panasonic has changed the humble image of the cloth clips by unveiling their re-incarnation of the simple design, adding LED lights, that aid in the process of drying garments whilst they are hanging on a washing line. The Panasonic BF-AF20P LED light is a revolution in the world of dry cleaning. The clip can not only be used as a handy torch to illuminate surrounding areas, but the attached LED is also designed to actively speed up the drying process when users peg up their clothes to dry.

The Japan-based company has taken into account all possible issues with the new gadget, cleverly making it waterproof, which is a necessary attribute when aiming to accomplish the task of helping users keep wet clothes on a clothesline.

The device comes in an array of different colours to suit buyers' preference including yellow, pink and blue. The LED lights run on two CR2032 button batteries, and measures 35mm × 34mm × 50mm, tipping the scales at approximately 19 grams, with batteries included.

The new clip is most likely to be made available this May, with details of an official price expected to be announced in the coming weeks.

Source : EFYTIMES

Conductive Ink : Part I

Don’t wire a circuit—doodle it. To connect batteries to devices such as resistors and LEDs, a newly developed ballpoint pen uses silver-based ink that conducts electricity through lines drawn over paper, wood, plastic and even some textiles. Jennifer Lewis, the materials scientist who led the pen’s design at the University of Illinois, says she is now looking for business partners and hopes to have products that integrate the pen and ink on the market within a few months.Check out Video on you-tube.



DuPont microcircuit materials offers a wide variety of conductive inks for Printed Electronics Applications. They include conductive silver ink, conductive carbon ink, silver chloride ink and dielectric ink which can be used to form conductive traces, capacitor and resistor elements, bio sensors and dielectric and encapsulating layers that are compatible with many substrate surfaces including polyester, glass, and ceramic.  DuPont conductive ink technologies are suitable for screen print, flexo, gravure, photo-pattern, pad printing, and other processing techniques.

These materials may be classed as fired high solids systems or PTF polymer thick film systems that allow circuits to be drawn or printed on a variety of substrate materials such as polyester to paper.

Conductive inks can be a more economical way to lay down a modern conductive traces when compared to traditional industrial standards such as etching copper from copper plated substrates to form the same conductive traces on relevant substrates, as printing is a purely additive process producing little to no waste streams which then have to be recovered or treated.

Silver inks have multiple uses today including printing RFID tags as used in modern transit tickets, they can be used to improvise or repair circuits on printed circuit boards.Computer keyboards contain membranes with printed circuits that sense when a key is pressed. Windshield defrosters consisting of resistive traces applied to the glass are also printed. Many newer cars have conductive traces printed on a rear window, serving as the radio antenna.

Printed paper and plastic sheets have problematic characteristics, primarily high resistance and lack of rigidity. The resistances are too high for the majority of circuit board work, and the non-rigid nature of the materials permits undesirable forces to be exerted on component connections, causing reliability problems. Consequently such materials are only used in a restricted range of applications, usually where the flexibility is important and no parts are mounted on the sheet.

See Also : Conductive ink lets you freehand circuits on the cheap

Next Post : How to make Conductive ink?

Sources:

rushigajjar.blogspot.com

www.popsci.com/diy/article/

www.wikipedia.com

blog.makezine.com

openmaterials.org

www.dupont.com

Translate your favorite blog into your tongue

rushigajjar.blogspot.com is now having the feature of converting posts from one to other. Enjoy Electronics in your own language.

Language can be changed from dropdown box available at top of the sidebar.

Select Language​▼

Thanks,

Rushi Gajjar

Principle of an Electronic Tube Light Ballast(Choke)

Gas discharge lamps, i.e lamps using the principle to make a gas electrically conductive and thereby light emitting, are a relatively old technique. Especially fluorescent lamps represent a very widespread lighting system. It is not possible to apply the line voltage directly to such lamp, be it AC or DC, a higher or a lower magnitude. Traditionally these lamps have always been operated on AC mains by means of a so-called magnetic ballast, which is nothing more than a reactor or choke, for limiting the lamp current. 







In recent years, as power electronics techniques came up, an alternative way of operation was introduced, the so-called electronic ballast, which converts the incoming mains frequency into a much higher frequency, usually in the range of 20 kHz to 80 kHz, to operate the lamp.

If we recall the wiring of a conventional tube light using the magnetic ballast, the complete circuit comprises of magnetic ballast, starter and the tube light. The role of starter and magnetic ballast together is to proved a high surge voltage using the principle self induction such that the gas inside the gas discharge lamp (in this case mercury vapor  gets ionized  Once the gas gets ionized  the electric current find an easy path trough the ionized gas tube thus lighting the tube light. The starter is out of circuit now as the same comes in parallel with the tube light and the tube light provides the low impedance path for the current. The ballast now provides only the 'regulating action' for tube light current. The magnetic ballast works at line frequency.

The function of electronic ballasts also is analogous to the magnetic ballast but accomplished with a higher frequency in the range of 40-80KHz than the line frequency. This technique is also applied in switch-mode power supplies (SMPS) to facilitate the use of a smaller transformer. The principle of transforming at higher frequencies is the same but with the advantage of compact size and less weight.


The working principle of the electronic fluorescent ballast is rather straightforward. The AC signal is first rectified and filtered using a bridge/capacitor configuration. The next stage is an oscillator stage. The rectified DC is applied to this stage which immediately starts oscillating at the required high frequency. The oscillations are typically square wave which is buffered via an inductor before it is finally used to ignite and illuminate the connected tube.

Introduction to Google Glass

There have been miscellaneous sightings of the prototype Google Glass Explorer Edition eyewear here and there since it debuted at the Google I/O conference last June, and in January and February of this year, developers got their first taste of what they could do with it.

Video : http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=v1uyQZNg2vE

And now, with the video above, we have a better idea of how Glass will work.

What is this actually?

Google Glass Explorer Edition is the first product to come out of the company's Project Glass. At its most basic level, a Glass device is something that lets you see and interact with the world around you without disconnecting from it.

The Glass headset is designed to be out of the way so it doesn't interfere with your activities. According to Google, it weighs less than most pairs of sunglasses. On the side is a touch pad for control, on top is a button for shooting photos and videos with the built-in camera, and there's a small information display positioned above the eye out of the line of sight.

The actual details about the specs that have been released are pretty light, other than to say the Explorer Edition has a camera, multiple radios for data communication, a speaker and a mic, and a gyroscope so Glass can tell your position and orientation at all times. Going by its FCC filing this includes a Broadcom 2.4GHz 802.11 b/g Wi-Fi radio and Bluetooth 4.0 as well as bone-conduction speakers, which would keep your ears open to your surroundings.

What to do with Glass?

Eventually the eyewear may lead you through every aspect of your waking life, but in its current state of development it looks like you'll be able to do things such as have Google+ Hangouts, live-stream video, and snap pictures or shoot some movies and share what you capture with little effort. Google search is, of course, part of the package.

Judging by the video above and the product site, you'll initiate a voice command by saying "OK, Glass," followed by whatever it is you want to do, such as "take a picture." The experience seems to be very similar to using Google Now on Android devices with Jelly Bean.

FEATURES: 

The glasses have audio output to the right ear only, and there's no earbud -- the sound just leaks into space. Best practice is to cup your hand over your ear and the glasses' temple to amplify the sound. This works well,but your gesture of cupping your hand over your ear alerts people near you that you are paying attention to the device.oops!!

Disabled were all the really cool features - SMS, alerts, and the capability to read e-mail.

The titanium-framed glasses headset was comfortable and very light.

Feature	Voice activation text
Record video	"ok, glass, record a video."
Take picture	"ok, glass, take a picture."
Use [[, glass, google photos of [search query]."
Translate	"ok, glass, say [text] in [language]."
Give directions	"ok, glass, give directions to [place]."
Send message	"ok, glass, send a message to [name]." "ok, glass, send [name] that [message]." "ok, glass, send [message] to [name]."
Display weather	none/automatically (Google Now) "ok, glass, how is the weather in [location]?" "ok, glass, do I need an umbrella today?"

Google Glass has the ability to take photos and record 720p HD video. While video is recording, a recording light is displayed above the eye, which is unnoticeable to the wearer.

Glass will utilize many already-existing Google applications, such as Google Now and Google Maps. The device will also be able to display the weather.

PRICE and AVAILABILITY:

Google Glass Explorer Edition was only available to developers as a preorder for U.S.-based I/O attendees, in 2012, for $1,500. However, until February 27, you can attempt to woo Google into letting you preorder a pair by telling the company what you would do if you had Glass.

Credits: 

Google,Wikipedia,cnet

Auto-Off feature for your Circuits:

After long time I'm posting on the blog, since I was busy with my works, I was unable to resist myself from putting this cute feature for our devices :

It's a good Pick: 

I was just surfing the internet  and I got to know this tiny circuit, which can help our circuits to Sleep or shut down when in Idle mode:

Kyle Wengenroth, Electronics geek, has recently made this device using AVR Tiny85, since the code is not long enough for this project, we can use any of the small micro-controllers with lesser space in ROM, using this concept(PIC may be bulky(DIP) but it is also good).

The basic idea behind the circuit is to use a microcontroller as a timer controlling two transistors. When Kyle‘s circuit is power cycled, the timer inside an AVR starts, making a pin high, and when the timer is up, making the pin low again. This pin feeds into a PNP transistor which is in turn connected to a NPN transistor, creating a very tiny auto off circuit for anything with an SPST switch.

Download the Code,Circuit.

Have a Look : 

Try this at home