Here is the release the 0-day CAD files for the lockpicks promised by Schuyler. I’m told he’ll put them online sometime, but it makes sense to release them here now.

Now we can all go get our picks manufactured. Chemical etching is likely the best way, but a stamp would also work dandy.

Download here: regotcad

Schuyler wrote:

“DXF files are attached. Looks like there are a few floating points in the too I just previewed, but
the gross majority of the data is all there. I’ll be reviewing and releasing these under a creative
commons license on Monday, and will release multiple formats. DXF happens to be what I had in email
as that was what my vendor requested.”

-3ric Johanson

While I have a love/hate relationships with social networks, I do tend to try and keep up to date in that world by using whatever myspace clone is all of the rage. This year it turned out to be called google plus.

All social networks all have this concept of identity and trust to manage. Reputation, trust and security are important to users; if they get spammed or hacked, they will leave. At the same time, you can’t truly authenticate a user without showing up at their house to look at their photo ID. Combine that with XSS, sql injection and homograph identity spoofing – - and you’ve got a “tricky to meet” set of requirements. These are hard problems. At the same time, they are hard problems they decided they wanted to solve. Sadly, my name falls into this strange edge case of “looking funny” while also being my legal name: A judge signed my name change. That’s a bit stronger of a ruling than any community guidelines posted on a dot com.

So I’ve been working with google over the past 2 weeks regarding my google plus account. Moments after I signed up (using my legal name of 3ric Johanson), I was informed that my account was suspended for violation of community standards.

The really good news is that google has an appeal process – provide more information to them, and “We try to complete reviews within one business day.” This is the first social network which seemly provides a clear path for managing this problem. Go google, maybe that’s how you earned your plus. There’s an amusing back story in here how my name is hard coded into the core facebook application, but I’ll leave that story for another day.

I have sent all of the information google has requested 3 times now. I had a kind director at google also inform them it’s really my name. At this point they have not responded to a single message in a week. While I understand they may not agree with the judge who signed my name change, it is in fact my legal name. For anyone with root@google, feel free to see the thread on ticket number 83274326.

My hope was that google would provide a level of professionalism which includes responding to their own defined appeal process. Sadly, they have left me disappointed. While I could try phishing around for more contacts at google, my interest in further supporting their project has sadly diminished. Dearest google, if you’d like me to play in your sandbox, you’ll have to come to me. Finally, if you are really unsure of my name, please just google me.

Regards,
-3ric Johanson

Hi 3ric,
Thank you for contacting us with regard to the name you want to use with
your Google Profile. After further review, we have determined that your
name is within our Community Standards policy. Thank you for your patience
while we reviewed your profile name.

Hello,

After reviewing your profile, it appears that the name you entered does not comply
with the Google+ Names Policy. Please log in to Google+ and visit your profile to
learn more and take action.

The Names Policy requires that you use the name you are commonly referred to in real
life in your profile. Nicknames, previous names, and so on should be entered in the
Other Names section of the profile. Profiles are currently limited to individuals;
we will be launching profiles for businesses and other entities later this year.

If you do not edit your name to comply with our Names policy or appeal with
additional information within four days of receiving this message, your profile will
be suspended. While suspended, you will not be able to make full use of Google
services that require an active profile, such as Google+, Buzz, Reader and Picasa.
This will not prevent you from using other Google services, like Gmail.

The Google+ team.

 * Sent google a link to this blog entry.

Re: [#892287923] Google Profile Name Review
Hi 3ric,

Thank you for contacting us with regard to the name you want to use with
your Google Profile. After further review, we have determined that your
name complies with our Community Standards. Thank you for your patience
while we reviewed your profile name.

Sincerely,
Duyen
The Google Profiles Support Team

Hello,

After reviewing your profile, it appears that the name you entered does not comply
with the Google+ Names Policy. Please log in to Google+ and visit your profile to
learn more and take action.

The Names Policy requires that you use the name you are commonly referred to in
real life in your profile. Nicknames, previous names, and so on should be entered
in the Other Names section of the profile. Profiles are currently limited to
individuals; we will be launching profiles for businesses and other entities later
this year.

If you do not edit your name to comply with our Names policy or appeal with
additional information within four days of receiving this message, your profile
will be suspended. While suspended, you will not be able to make full use of Google
services that require an active profile, such as Google+, Buzz, Reader and Picasa.
This will not prevent you from using other Google services, like Gmail.

The Google+ team.

Re: [#892287923] Google Profile Name Review
Hi there,

4 days ago I received this email.   Yesterday I received notice that I'm suspended
again.

Any idea what's going on this time?   This makes the 3rd time you've blocked me for
my legal name. 

Thanks,
-3ric

 * zero response from google support department.
 * Sent google a link to this blog entry via the "submit additional information" process, again.
 * backed up all of my data from google.

Our thanks to Intellectual Ventures Lab for use of the camera!

The fume hood ducting has been completed. Bring on the DIY chemistry. Not much else to say…it’s a fume hood…it sucks.

Specs: 3 units are round, 2 of these have power supplies (120V 2A). The one without a power supply is $50 off. 4th unit is triple lobed and comes with power supply (120V 6A). All come with ceiling mounts.

TL;DR: bright. heavy.

contact HBL.stuff@gmail.  Note: you’ll need a VERY large trunk or pickup truck to get it home.

However, we still have one lingering toy – - An amazing mill. This device needs a good home. We purchased this mill several years ago – - it was our first mill, and we used it quite a bit for all sorts of projects. It’s a large beast – - very stiff – - it can really remove some massive amounts of material. Along with the size, comes very clean cuts. One of the core reasons we purchased this mill and not a small desktop mill was our desire for high quality cuts. Benchtop mills are not very rigid – - they flex a bunch while cutting, and this can cause ‘chatter’ which impacts the accuracy and quality of the cut. This mill does not suffer from this problem, due to it’s size and mass.

Anyway, back to my point. We still have this mill, but we also just purchased a fancy pants cnc mill. Thus, we don’t need our trusty standby any more. We’ve treated it with care and love.. and even added our own glass scale DRO to the system. If you are considering taking our lovely mill home with you, here’s some of the highlights:

– ~24x 14×19″ of travel.
– about 6 tons
– Will fit through a 8×8 doorway.
– We have a relationship with a rigger who can move it. Cost of moving it is dependant on distance, but something on the order of a several hundred dollars (we paid ~500 to have it brought here from Everett, but rigging costs have gone up a bit)
– 240volt, 3 phase (but could be used on single phase with a phase converter, not included)
– NMBT 50 taper, with LOTS of toolholders included. The tool holders alone are worth a grand or two; no tooling is included.
– Something on the order of 5ph motor, max of 1000RPM.
– Manual transmission – so at low speeds this machine has super torque.
– power feeds on all axis.
– Meister 3-axis BC10M DRO, with glass scales. It does advanced mathematics for you, so says the manual. We paid ~1500 bucks for the DRO system.
– Has some minor oil leaks which we’ve tried to repair, but it’s never seemed worth it to rebuild the seals on the spindle (which is working fine otherwise).
– There is an issue with the gibs which reduces the effective longitudinal travel to about 2/3 of the factory specification of 33 inches, but we’ve never found this issue preventing us from machining anything. This is likely repairable if the table is removed, but it weighs about a thousand pounds, thus… we’ve not bothered.
– *FULL MANUALS*
– about 5 gallons of way oil to feed the machine as needed (will likely last a year or two depending on usage of the mill)
– Asking price: $2,000
– Photos can be found here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/3ricj/sets/72157626511965684/
– When we purchased the mill in April 2006, we took some photos: http://www.flickr.com/photos/3ricj/sets/72057594105800022/
– Interested? email: info ATTY hackerbotlabs DOTTY com

It was this really nifty quadcopter being controlled by an android phone. Speaking to the people running the booth, the client was open source. They even had a cute android body on the quadcopter. Fast forward a bit – - I find they are available for preorder finally.. and I place my order and wait. Today, my new toy has arrived.

Only to find out that no android client exists. I have to use an iphone? I refuse to own an iphone. And that “open source” client? Well, it’s an SDK, with a highly restrictive (and really poorly grammered) license. It says if I don’t want to use it to make a free game, I’m not licensed to use the SDK. WTF people. You can’t show a product with specific features off at a conference (Android client) and then ship me a product with missing KEY features. LAME ASS SHIT.

There are a bunch of posts from the developers asking people to use their SDK to make an android client. And that the one shown off at googleIO won’t get released. Really? Lame, LAME, *LAME*. Future Ar.Drone customers: Be warned. I think they hang you for Bait and switch sales tactics in France, no wonder french this company only sells them in North America.

Update: THEY ARE IN COMPLETE VIOLATION OF THE GPL:

https://projects.ardrone.org/boards/1/topics/show/216

To quote their blog, “Ada’s Technical Books is Seattle’s only technical book store located in the Capitol Hill neighborhood of Seattle, Washington. Ada’s specifically carries new, used, & rare books on Computers, Electronics, Physics, Math, and Science as well as hand-picked inspirational and leisure reading, puzzles, brain teasers, and gadgets geared toward the technically minded customer. Ada’s Grand Opening is scheduled for Friday, June 11th and monthly events, featured author presentations, and book signings will be scheduled throughout the year.”

The Grand Opening will be an exciting event. “The grand opening is going to be great… it will include free food and drinks, giveaways, and discounts on everything in the store. So, put June 11th, from 5-8pm on your calendars. And, in the meantime, stop by and say hello. We can’t wait to meet you.”

http://www.seattletechnicalbooks.com/

I modified a Canon SD1200 point n’ shot such that it can only be used for photographing non-visible light. Here’s how you do that: Disassemble your camera such that you can extract the window right in front of the camera sensor. Make sure you use gloves and keep track of your screws and tiny bits. Don’t get dust/fingerprints on your optics. Remove the existing IR blocking filter carefully with a tweezers on the edge. Having things like lens tissue is good to have around to place your optics on. Once you extract this IR blocking sensor, you’ll need to replace it with a suitable ‘window’ of the same size and thickness. With my camera, the window was 7.9mm x 8.88mm by 0.22mm thick. I found that I had glass coverslips which where pretty close in thickness (0.18mm). Using AR coated glass from edmonds optics or thorlabs will give you much better results. Sizing down this window was tricky – - Markr finally got one the right size. If your window is thick you might need a glass cutter; in my case 0.18mm glass can be cut with snips and broken to size easily.

Once you have it cut down to size, you must clean it completely. Lab grade acetone or methanol is the ideal cleaning solvent. Grasp your new window by the edges using tweezers, eyedrop a bit of acetone onto the surface, then quickly blow it off using a can of air. Don’t use ‘shop air’ as it frequently contains quite a bit of water and oil. Repeat as needed until it is clean.

Once your camera is reassembled, you can take ‘full color’ photos. Most photos will look far more ‘red’ than before. Check that your focus is still ok – - if you get your window thickness wrong your camera will be near sighted or far-sighted.

For the really fun stuff, you need to filter out visible light. You can do this using a visible light filter (such as a 87 filter from a camera shop, $150) or you can make your own filter using non-exposed developed film. If you find a place which develops medium format film, give them some non-exposed film and ask them to develop it. Make sure you tell them that the resulting pictures will be pure ‘black’.. that’s what you want. Film which has been prepared like this has one very tricky attribute: It will block nearly all visible light, but pass most IR light. Now you cut down this film in order to make a filter on your hacked camera. This can be done after the optics on the front of the camera, or could in theory be installed in front of the sensor.

What does this look like?

Here is the back of a 5 dollar bill which has been photographed using a full spectrum camera:

.. and here it is in ‘pure’ IR:

Note the interesting lack of print over sections of the bill.

For extra credit, you can also filter out the light on your flash, such that it only emits IR. “non-LED” Camera flashes produce quite a bit of IR, so you can use the same film filter to block the visible light on your camera flash and only produce IR. The resulting camera can take shots at night without a visible flash – - all sorts of fun purposes for this.

Here’s an example of a tree photographed in pure IR:

More examples can be found here, or by googling IR photography.