documentation

this does not work. at all.
after snapping this pic, i added an external power supply for the motor. still doesn't work.

life is grim.

i'll give this another try soon.

Aaaaaayooo

The potentiometer on the left controls the servo motor on the right. With a nearly one to one relationship of degrees rotated.
Of course a photograph alone does not provide sufficient evidence that it actually works, so you'll just have to take my word for it I guess.

I basically copied the tutorial exactly (again...)
At least this time around I copied the arduino code rather than just cut and pasting it. Can't say I knew what I was copying, but it was still somewhat helpful.

Oscar and I kicked around an idea today about making pressure-triggered turn signal for a long board. Pretty corny, but funny. I think I'm gonna try to do it, though. Just gotta figure out how...

Our observation was based on the door close button found in elevators. We noticed that upon pressing this button, the doors didn't seem to close any faster. Also, there was no feedback on the button (a light, etc) to prove that the button was actually working. Our theory was that the door close button was a placebo and the following describes how we went about exploring this issue.

I. Gathering data with a video camera.
Initially we decided to use video to extract the following data:
+ time difference between door open and close.
+ time difference between the last person stepping out and door close
+ whether or not 'door close' button was pressed and its effect on the two previous variables.
+ so, the time difference between the first press and when the door actually closes.

Also we meant to take note of people's mood:
+ how many times people pressed the button
+ how quick were they to press the button
+ did they seem like they were in a hurry?
+ also, whether the elevator is going up or down has discernible bearing on people's patience

However, we quickly realized that without rigging the camera up high, video was not the ideal medium for gathering data. It's too hard to "get a good shot" or angle that could capture all this information, especially with people standing right in front of the buttons.

Also, people are quick to interpret use of a video camera in an elevator as a security threat. This was made clear as we were kicked out of two buildings for that reason.

II. Final Results: Door Close Times.
So we decided to simplify our method of gathering data. We split it up into two parts:
1. To determine if the door-close button works or not, we don't actually need to observe people other people using it. So we ran our own tests using stopwatches when we were able to get the elevator to ourselves.

A. We timed the door opening and closing without anyone getting on or off. The average time was between 11.65 [from close state to close state]. So about 12 seconds (accounting for human stop-watch error).

B. We also tested the motion sensors in the elevator door. There is a delay of approximately two seconds between the last person to pass through the door and when the door starts to close.

C (&D). We then ran scenarios A and B over again, except this time pressing the door-close button. After relatively few iterations we were quick to realize that the button had no discernible effect on the door-close times in either situation.

III. Final Results: Emotions of Users

We then rode the elevator with the intent of observing people's interaction with the button. Our findings were as follows:

Our test environment is defined as each time the elevator stopped at a floor while passengers remained on board.
- In 45% of these scenarios, someone on the elevator pressed the door close button.
- 70% of the 'pressers' seemed like they were in a hurry (duh), the other 30% seemed like they just did it all the time.
- Most pressers pressed more than once or held it down.
- Among the people who did not press the button, I got the sneaking suspicion that 25% of them internalized the futility of the whole endeavor.

Fairly straightforward.

These photos are from a couple weeks ago, so I can't really remember what specifically gave me trouble with this lab. I do remember, however, spending an extraordinary amount of time 'learning how to soder' before I realized I was using a semi-busted iron.

So anyway, proof I did the lab: