We marked the beginning of a new BlinkenArea at HAR a few weeks ago. Of course, we showcased our flashlight projects and we had a great looking tent with an amazing atmosphere according to our new motto “Light. Beauty. More.”. But we also added some static lights in the treetops near our village — our wonderful Blue Tree Lighting — to head for our new field of activity: light up things and create more beauty.
During What The Hack!, the BlinkenArea was encircled by construction lights. They were blinking all in a tumble, because they were not phased so far. Since HAR, the construction lights are operated by full flashlight support. The Chaos Construction Light Controller 32 (CCLC32) provides 32 outputs, which can be connected to construction lights, when those are rebuilt in a certain way. A serial interface can receive CCLC32 data from BlinkenOutput. Furthermore, a running light-function is integrated as well.
A scheme and a part list can be found on the CCLS32 page at our Wiki.
The building, in which project bluebox took place, had been built in 1967. Shortly after the German Reunification, all inhabitants started to move out. Almost each of them left behind a nice ceiling light in his or her flat. In the run-up to HAR2009, nine of the old lamps went into action again. After cleaning and repairing them, they were arranged as a 3×3 matrix. Now, they are showing the appropriate hacker symbol Glider, which refers the the hacker culture around free software and open source. See Wikipedia for further information..
