Arduino Interest in Toronto or Waterloo, Ontario

Nigel and the gang et al,

Sorry to be so long in dashing off an update, but I have been on-site doing a project install for most of the week.

Three of us met on Saturday morning (Darudude, myself and a Marianne (TBC) from UoW engineering) for about 90 minutes.

It gave us a chance to talk about Arduinos, how we came to be involved with them, some discussion about our current Arduino projects, some suggestions regarding Arduino sources and a small bit of show and tell.

Amongst this small group there appears to be a definite interest in forming a more organized Arduino Interest Group, although based on the current schedules for the other two participants, we will likely not be able to meet again until May.

There is a possibility that we could meet elsewhere although the UoW did work out fairly well.

How about you Toronto area folks, when are you getting together?
Surely, you are not going to let Waterloo become the centre of the Canadian Arduino universe are you?

I am so in for a Kitchener/Waterloo group, I am a software engineer and live downtown kitchener, please let me know the next time people want to meet arround here ;D

I'm a UWaterloo student interested in meeting up too, this summer.

UW arch student, living in Cambridge. I would really like to get involved in some sort of an Arduino club. I have a few projects in mind that I plan to work on. Contact me if you're arranging anything in the near-ish future.

[Although I had originally sent this to Elizabeth as a private message, I have since figured out that it would be best to post the message on the open board as it might just help flush a few more Cambrridge, Kitchener, Waterloo, Guelph or Brantford Arduionites out of the woodwork.]

Elizabeth,

Although, I have been playing around with Arduinos off and on for the past year . . . I am still a relative new Arduinoite as well. My background includes a fair bit of electronic hobby work, so the hardware end is easier for me than the programming end.

Having said that, a year ago I was trying to get an Arduino Interest Group started in this area; however the two or three other people that were interested were UoW coop students who were about to go out on their work terms so things never got off the ground beyond a couple of 1/2 hour introductory meetings.

I might be willing to meet with you and some of your class mates to talk about Arduinos and perhaps show some basic functionality. At this time, I work Monday-Thursday plus some Fridays; so my availability would either be weeknights, the weekend or possibly on a Friday.

As far as introductory books and tutorials I recommend:

Getting Started with Arduino by Massimo Banzi (one of the founding fathers of the Arduino)

The book can be ordered through Chapters or Amazon or from many of the internet based Arduino suppliers.

The other resource that I would highly recommend is:

The Complete Beginners Guide to the Arduino by Mike McRoberts
http://earthshinedesign.co.uk/ASKManual/
This is a free E-book that will lead you from flashing LED's and driving simple DC motors to creating simple sounds and monitoring basic sensors.

Hi everyone.
My name is Patrick, and I live in Ottawa. I was born and Raised in Waterloo. I work for two businesses:
electroniclessons.com and engineeringshock.com If there are any grounds out there that are looking for anything specific, or perhaps a bulk order of arduino modules of any kind, we can get them. Right now, we are uploading new ebay listings for arduino. For buy-it-now parts, go to electroniclessons.com. Units purchased from there will ship out from my home in Ottawa. Inquiries about Bulk orders of ANYTHING can be done at engineeringshock.com. We can supply awesome deals in bulk if there are groups out there that want to band together for a large order. If we can help in any way, please let us know. We are a hobby and engineering based group of people, and we are just starting up. Some of our product/project videos can be found by searching "patrickikis" on youtube.
Thanks everyone!

Sincerely,
Patrick

Hi everyone!
I am looking for somebody with an experience in programming
Arduino RB-Ard products for the robot's prototype.
Do you have anybody in mind?
Thanks!

Hi I am a old guy from Toronto,too. Anyone still here?

Yet another "old guy" in Toronto looking for help with programing. It would be great to grab a coffee and discuss projects and solutions.

Paul

I too am interested.. I work in downtown Toronto and live in Durham..

Count me in for the Waterloo area... Could make Toronto.

Kevin

Hello, everyone. I live in Vauhan and work in downtown Toronto.

I have been enjoyed playing with Arduino for sometime and dropped by this forum occasionally to find answers for my own small projects and finally registered.

Nice to meet you all and happy new year! :slight_smile:

I am completely new to electronics and programing so I cannot offer any knowledge.

What I can offer is a place to meet for those in Toronto.

I live in the Bathurst and Dupont area and will swap home made cookies (don't worry, my wife makes them) and pizza for help getting a virtual USB keyboard running on my UNO. I want to learn what is going on with the code rather than just cut and paste. Mind you, a working code would be nice to have so that I can compare any modifications I make to a working one.

I am also willing to go to Waterloo as I have several customers there.

Post if you are interested in meeting then we can take it off line for details.

Another great source of parts and Arduino is Creatroninc at the south east corner of Spadina and College. Do not let his website fool you, he has a very good supply of components, shields, and projects. They are very helpful and offer very good customer service.

Paul H

Again, a great place to meet in Toronto is the Site3 maker workshop. They have an open house on Thursdays between 7-10PM. Want to see the Laser CNC?
Oh, I almost forgot, there is also the HackLab! They have an open house on Tuesdays after 5:30. Want to see the Makerbot 3D printer?

I will be checking out HackLab this Tuesday night.

Paul

Hey Paul,

Site 3 is close to where you live, on bloor and ossington.
I ended out joining as a associate member, lots of space , lots of tools.

Id be interested in giving you a hand with your project, but ill have to do some research first :wink:

Cheers
Kym

Thank you for the offer Kym, I will gladly take you up on it.
I intend on visiting Site3 as well. Both are in walking distance.

You will not need much research. If you know any C then you are much further than I am. There is progress, it is my lack of programing knowledge that is holding me back.

Fire me a PM and I can give you an idea of what I am trying to do. Beers on me.

Paul

I had a wonderful time at Hacklabs in Toronto. Very helpful and enthusiastic group. Lots of very interesting projects in various stages of completion. They took time to hear what my project was about, what I was having difficulty with, and then jumped into show me what was needed. I am looking forward to visiting again!

I had no idea there was such a great resource so close to where I live as well as so close to a huge variety of excellent food establishments.

I will also drop in to site3 shortly to see what they have to offer.

Paul

Don't know if anyone noticed this slightly specialized workshop in Toronto in March:

ARDUINO INTERACTIVE CINEMA INTENSIVE
Expand the potential of cinema art with Arduino
Schedule
Friday March 18th 6pm-10pm
Saturday March 19th 12pm-5pm
Sunday March 20th 12pm-5pm

Cost Members $195 Non-members $225 Enrollment is limited to 8

Explore the possibilities of Arduino, a versatile program for making interactive art. Arduino is a tool for making computers that can sense and control more of the physical world than your desktop computer. It's an open-source physical computing platform based on a simple microcontroller board, and a development environment for writing software for the board. This three day intensive with LIFT Artist In Residence Enrico Mandirola will give you the knowledge and hands on training to bring Arduino into your cinema art practice. LIFT will provide basic Arduino hardware and required materials. Please provide an outline of your proposed project to registration@lift.on.ca by Friday March 11th 2011.

http://www.lift.on.ca/mt/archives/workshops_intensives_1.html

There's also a small display of Arduino-based kinetic art on the ground floor of 401 Richmond right now.