The Big Book Of Maker Skills

This ultimate guide for tech makers covers everything from hand tools to robots plus essential techniques for completing almost any DIY project. Makers, get ready: This is your must-have guide to taking your DIY projects to the next level. Legendary fabricator and alternative engineer Chris Hackett teams up with the editors of Popular Science to offer detailed instruction on everything from basic wood- and metalworking skills to 3D printing and laser-cutting wizardry. Hackett also explains the entrepreneurial and crowd-sourcing tactics needed to transform your back-of-the-envelope idea into a gleaming finished product. In The Big Book of Maker Skills, readers learn tried-and-true techniques from the shop classes of yore—how to use a metal lathe, or pick the perfect drill bit or saw—and get introduced to a whole new world of modern manufacturing technologies, like using CAD software, printing circuits, and more. Step-by-step illustrations, helpful diagrams, and exceptional photography make this book an easy-to-follow guide to getting your project done.

Ingenious (and hilarious) projects that aspiring makers will love, brought to you by the tinkerers at Popular Science magazine. From useful, doable gadgets to outlandish contraptions that you’d likely be wise to avoid, this showcase of ingenuity is an entertaining tribute to the inventive spirit. In this book from the science and technology magazine that’s been inspiring everyday people for nearly 150 years, you’ll discover: Geek Toys: Be the life of any party with rad gaming hacks, amazing pyrotechnics, quirky DIY robots, wow-inducing projectiles, and lots of ways to make beer even better. Home Improvements: Pimp out your pad with a laser-security system, an improvised sous-vide cooker, and a life-sized cardboard display of anyone you want. Gadget Upgrades: Want to stash a flash drive in an old cassette? Use a DIY stylus on a touchscreen? Improvise a fisheye lens for your camera? With this book, you can. Things That Go: Give your motorbike a Tron vibe, deck out your car with an action-figure hood ornament, and keep gadgets charged on the go with a solar-powered backpack. …and much more!

Start-to-finish, fun projects for makers of all types, ages, and skill levels! This easy-to-follow guide features dozens of DIY, low-cost projects that will arm you with the skills necessary to dream up and build your own creations. The Big Book of Makerspace Projects: Inspiring Makers to Experiment, Create, and Learn offers practical tips for beginners and open-ended challenges for advanced makers. Each project features non-technical, step-by-step instructions with photos and illustrations to ensure success and expand your imagination. You will learn recyclables hacks, smartphone tweaks, paper circuits, e-textiles, musical instruments, coding and programming, 3-D printing, and much, much more! Discover how to create: • Brushbot warriors, scribble machines, and balloon hovercrafts • Smartphone illusions, holograms, and projections • Paper circuits, origami, greeting cards, and pop-ups • Dodgeball, mazes, and other interesting Scratch games • Organs, guitars, and percussion instruments • Sewed LED bracelets, art cuffs, and Arduino stuffie • Makey Makey and littleBits gadgets • Programs for plug-and-play and Bluetooth-enabled robots • 3D design and printing projects and enhancements

After Bart King interviewed hundreds of the wisest guys and smartest alecks for The Big Book of Boy Stuff, something awesome happened: the book became a classic! Hailed by critics and kids alike, it has sold hundreds of thousands of copies, and even won awards. In this updated and redesigned tenth anniversary edition, hijinks and hilarity are still front and center. Within these pages, boys can find a myriad of things to do, things to laugh at, and things they didn’t know. Bart King, the veteran of many water balloon wars, taught middle school for many years. He’s written other cool books, including The Big Book of Superheroes, The Pocket Guide to Girl Stuff, and The Big Book of Gross Stuff. Visit his website at www.bartking.net.

Classic and innovative hands-on projects for kids ages 3 and up designed to teach both heritage skills and how to think creatively. Handcraft is part of human nature: we build, we create, we innovate. The 20+ projects in this book from an experienced art educator weave a story of human innovation and creativity, from the very beginnings of building shelters in the woods to tinkering with recycled materials. Heritage skills teach children how to be independent and capable makers; fiber and wood projects offer rewarding crafts that also teach planning, preparation, and safe risk taking; and tinkering activities connect the low-tech process of making and doing with innovation. From soap carving and knot tying to building toy cars and junk robots, this book brings the fun of making things with your hands to young kids and links skills of the past with the present. The book also explores how to set up a maker space and teaches foundational workshop practices that can easily be applied to the home studio. Each project offers extensions for different ages and abilities and provides guiding questions to enrich the experience for both the maker (teacher/parent) and the apprentice (child) to encourage and celebrate creative, practical play.

Why do we make things? Why do we choose the emotionally and physically demanding work of bringing new objects into the world with creativity and skill? Why does it matter that we make things well? What is the nature of work? And what is the nature of a good life? This January, whether you're honing your craft or turning your hand to a new skill, discover the true value in what it means to be a craftsman in a mass-produced world. Part memoir, part polemic, part philosophical reflection, this is a book about the process of creation. For woodworker Peter Korn, the challenging work of bringing something new and meaningful into the world through one's own efforts is exactly what generates authenticity, meaning, and fulfilment, for which many of us yearn. This is not a 'how-to' book in any sense, Korn wants to get at the 'why' of craft in particular, and the satisfaction of creative work in general, to understand its essential nature. How does the making of objects shape our identities? How do the products of creative work inform society? In short, what does the process of making things reveal to us about ourselves? Korn draws on four decades of hands-on experience to answer these questions eloquently in this heartfelt, personal and revealing book. 'If you are in the building trade or just love creating things as a hobby, you will find this book fascinating' The Sun

Turn your projects from a weekend hack to a long-living creation! Loosely drawing from the field known in large software companies as Site Reliability Engineering (SRE), this book distills from these disciplines and addresses issues that matter to makers: keeping projects up and running, and providing means to control, monitor, and troubleshoot them. Most examples use the Raspberry Pi, but the techniques discussed apply to other platforms as well. This book is all about breadth, and in the spirit of making, it visits different technologies as needed. However, the big goal in this book is to create a shift in the reader’s mindset, where weekend hacks are pushed to the next level and are treated as products to be deployed. In that regard, this book can be a stepping stone for hobbyist makers into developing a broader, professional skill set. First, the book describes techniques for creating web-browser based dashboards for projects. These allow project creators to monitor, control, and troubleshoot their projects in real-time. Project Reliability Engineering discusses various aspects of the process of creating a web dashboard, such as network communication protocols, multithreading, and web design, and data visualization. Later chapters cover configuration of the project and the machine it’s running on, and additional techniques for project monitoring and diagnosis. These include good logging practices; automatic log and metrics monitoring; and alerting via email and text messages; A mixture of advanced concepts forms the last chapter of the book, touching on topics such as usage of microservices in complex projects; debugging techniques for object-oriented projects; and fail-safing the project’s software and hardware. What You’ll Learn Monitor and control projects, keep them up and running, and troubleshoot them efficiently Get acquainted with available tools and libraries, and learn how to make your own tools Expand your knowledge in Python, JavaScript and Linux Develop deeper understanding of web technologies Design robust and complex systems Who This Book Is For Members of the maker community with some development skills.