New Year's resolutions...

This year is coming to an end and this will be my last post (this year). I didn't post as many times as I wanted (I planned once a week, I'm close to once every two weeks), but that's the way life goes.
Most projects are "work in progress", so these are in plan for next year:

1. in the mini68k I wanted to finish a working gdb-stub before advancing to the CP/M-68K code. I finally managed to make it work, but there were some bumps in the way. The way ahead is not without it's perils, to use gdb and CP/M at the same time I might need an extra serial port for which I have no breadboard space. I'll need to draw the schematics, possibly make a PCB, make the SDCard interface work and then port CP/M to it;
2. in the mini85 I wandered off in some hardware questions (casing, with a floppy or without, processor speed, with DMA, cheap DMA, video, expansion, connectors, front panel, size of RAM, SD Card, SD Card removable, Flash or Eprom, serial ports, parallel port...). I'll need to settle down on the hardware, draw schematics, make PCB, fit in a case and close it;
3. in the Solarlight project I still want to fit it neatly on top of my Pepper pot and to tune some more code, also add a larger heatsink for the LED. I also plan to do a new SMD PCB and bake the components in a SMD oven. Further, I'd like to build a bike light with the same circuit but no solar charger. I'll need to get the final schematic, draw the SMD PCB for solarlight and bikelight and make the code linux-buildable and downloadable;
4. in the SBC6120 project I'll need to decide on how to fit everything inside the box and fix the harddisk to the PCB, also design the front panel, back panel and connectors.
5. in the home monitoring project I'll need to rewrite the code for the new light sensor and adjust the pachube data to it.

I don't think I'll run out of electronics projects for next year, but if just in case I do, I have to change a pedal crank on my Kronan (got bent on a recent fall on the snow) and I'm waiting for some studded tires :-) , read some more books and try to reduce a bit the coffee intake...

Back from Holidays - Frappé

This year we went to Greece, Crete in particular, for our summer get away. It was fantastic, great beaches, great landscapes, great food, great weather, all this and you still can visit some impressive archaeological sites.



It has been some time since I posted about coffee, probably because other than being "surprised" by the excessive price of an expresso, nothing of notice happens outside...
Well in Crete I've found what is probably the only good use of instant coffee... meet the Frappé!.
This is how I do mine, I've talked to some Greek friends and they do it a bit differently...
Put the instant coffee (one or two spoons) and some sugar (with sugar you can do more foam) in a glass and add a few drops (or a table spoon of water).

Use the an electric whisk until you a get a foamy cream.

Whisk until the foam starts getting white in colour.

Add water and ice, a straw and you're done... Instant frappé!

Serralves... Meia de Leite (almost a Cappucino)

I never miss a chance to visit Serralves, the Portuguese Museum of Modern Art in Porto. If don't like the art, or find it too difficult to digest... This was the floor in one of the rooms... I found it disturbing, I could look at it for hours...

But the best seat in the room was taken...


You can always go to any of the three cafeterias in the compound, good coffee, quality savories... Fantastic...
The top restaurant has a reasonable buffet and a great view over the park, the lower floor level cafeteria has a great window facing the grass, very Zen... but probably the top is the Tee House, so 1920's-1930's a Tee house in front of the gravel Tennis court... The perfect place to read the newspaper weekend edition, if you're watching the rain from the inside... very peaceful... Love it!

In Portugal you can have a "meia de leite", litteraly "half milk" the equivalent in the Netherlands would be half of a "Koffie Verkeerd", I've had some Latte's and Machiattos in my day, but there's nothing like a Meia-de-leite. If you want to try it is a long expresso with the same amount of vapor heated milk, it should look like this..

Coffeeeeee...

The fact is, I really like coffee... strong coffee...

Last year I bought a new cafeteria a Bialetti Brikka, it has a special valve that creates some pressure when the hot water is going through the coffee. The result is a almost expresso like coffee, without the mess and size of an expresso machine or beeing limited to the cartdrige or pad type pseudo-expresso.
For the best coffee I use fresh milled coffee beans (kept in the fridge), the Brikka and filtered water (this last one really makes a difference here in Holland).
Enjoy your coffee....