Archive: Hack the Space

The "Somebody Should" List (formerly known as Hack The Space)

This page is here just to give you an idea where the "Somebody Should" list came from, you now want to look at the GitHub Issues instead

A page to list things that could(/should) be done to make DoES Liverpool more awesome.

It is a place to list the things that Somebody(tm) should do. It is important to remember that the "Somebody Should" in the title is a shortened form of "somebody should (and, if no-one else has done it before I get chance, I will)...". That is, a place to put things that you intend to do, so there's a chance that someone with more free time can do it before you get to it (at which point you can pick something else off the list to reduce someone else's workload :-)

We need to be careful that it doesn't result in the other option of "somebody should" when there was an important job to be done and Everybody was asked to do it. Everybody was sure Somebody would do it. Anybody could have done it, but Nobody did it. Somebody got angry about that because it was Everybody's job. Everybody thought Anybody could do it, but Nobody realized that Everybody wouldn't do it. It ended up that Everybody blamed Somebody when actually Nobody asked Anybody.

If you want to organise a day for people to work on stuff with you, the mailing list is over there... :-)

Who is Somebody? aka. "Can I do stuff without people shouting at me?"

The "Do" in "DoES" stands for, um, "Do". We'd like everybody at DoES to feel free to suggest, and make changes and improvements. We don't have a lot of procedure or organisational hierarchy, so if you can answer these questions:

• Do I want to do this?
• Do I know how to do this?
• Can I do it legally and safely?
• Am I happy to take responsibility for it? (the task, communicating it, any financial expenditure, and any issues/whining arising?)

Then just go for it!

If you're not then why not:

• Log it here and see if a bigger group can answer yes to those questions
• Open a pledge on DoESPledges to see if a bigger group can raise any money for it

And of course speak to people at DoES or on the mailing list.

General

I.e. things that aren't associated with a particular room

• Make any improvements to the Network that have been suggested in the Network page.
• Add a MakerspaceStatus device inside the door of the main room and the workshop to set the open/closed state of DoES. (InternTasks WIP)
• Write a system to automatically generate the content to go in the #weeknotes blog posts (see AdrianMcEwen for more detailed spec, work-in-progress - see https://github.com/DoESLiverpool/weeknote-generator)
• Assemble and install the AirQualityEgg somewhere to monitor air quality (see AdrianMcEwen for more about it, and the hardware)
• Put the DoES Liverpool Little Printer to work (see AdrianMcEwen for more)
• Create a leaflet rack to store DoES flyers and other leaflets we get sent. Hang it on the wall in the corridor next to the door to New Dinky?
  • We now have three plastic leaflet racks that could be attached to the wall
• Set up Asterisk to handle phone calls, reports to IRC & Twitter when we get a call with a link to download the message. Might be good to have some VOIP phones somewhere but IRC notification that the existing phone is ringing would be a start.
• Set up a Raspberry Pi somewhere running Node RED, as that should make it easier to wire together the growing collection of IoT devices in the space - for example, the doorbots could publish entry/exit events, and then a task could be added to Node RED to subscribe to that and announce it on IRC (Node RED has some sort of IRC integration out-of-the-box)
• Write some code to spot new users (on the Induction Spreadsheet) and create an account for them on this wiki. (see AdrianMcEwen for more about it).

Workshop

• Sort tools into workbench drawers, and label the drawers
• Run Cat5 through from the meeting room (there's a suitably sized gap between the window and the wall) to provide wired Ethernet to the Laser Cutter PC and hooked up to one of the spare routers to provide better WiFi
• Move one of the racks from the workshop into the meeting room in New Dinky (until we get a messy workshop to move it into)
• Organise the 3-week box system
• Sort through remaining unlabelled items on racking and put into labelled boxes or the 3-week box
• Fix drawers on the woodworking bench so they open and close easily
• Arrange some vertical storage for sheet materials? (the blue foam, foamcore, etc. at least)
• Laser-cut some spool holders to mount on the back of the electronics workbench to mount the wire spools onto - WIP, Patrick on the case
• Fix up the filter on the laser-cutter. We've got a carbon filter, but that leaks smoke out into the room - need to at least box it up and vent the smoke out the window
• Improve the distribution of power sockets round the room. Maybe with one of these over the centre island - http://www.rapidonline.com/Cables-Connectors/Energycube-Hanging-2-Sided-Extenel-23-0220/
• Buy and fit some pegboard onto the wall next to the woodworking bench, then arrange tools on it with shadows painted to show what goes where
• Improve "Tools" draw in the electronics workbench
• Finish sorting out the DoesOscilloscopes from NOC (JRPeterson and Mark Holmes own this at the moment)
• Sort components from NOC into proper storage (JRPeterson and Mark Holmes working on this so far)
• Put a current monitor on the Laser, use it to work out how much usage it gets.
• Finish getting the CNCMill running
• Rejig the laser cutter wiki pages to be more useful to newcomers, use some of the documentation provided by Becka.
• Make Re-paint (white) the bezel for the screen on the DoorBot

Kitchen

• Buy (or laser-cut, but that might be overkill :-) a draining rack
• Label the cupboards so newcomers can find things more easily (AdrianMcEwen was thinking of drawing some with the PolarGraph)
• The CoffeeBot currently records the weight of coffee in the coffee pot.
• API/Web site/App for the coffee pot:
• Find out how much coffee is left
• Request that coffee be made
• Randomly be assigned to make coffee when enough people want it.
• Implement RFC2325 for the CoffeeBot
• Fix small leak under kitchen sink - couple of small drop leaks

DoorBot

• Move this list onto the DoorBot page.
• Swap the Raspberry Pis in Doorbot1 (main room) for Doorbot3 (Dinky) to see if it's more reliable with more memory (because Doorbot1 has a first gen Pi with 256MB of RAM)
• Add a door bell that sends messages to twitter and IRC (and rings a bell, in both rooms).
• Add some mechanism to remotely unlock the door that is simpler to use than ssh.
• Something for sending messages to the screen, e.g "We're in the workshop", from IRC, Twitter, web
• Eventually would be good to have a central database containing the access restrictions rather than updating a flat file and copying between boxes.
• The screen should do something when you tap a card.
• Report when there is a problem logging hot desk usage, i.e. when the internet access is down
• Add a standalone DoorbellPrinter to the main door that prints a different message depending on the MakerspaceStatus (Could be rolled into the DoorBot later) - (InternTasks WIP)
• The doorbot isn't logging half days, so when people come in in the morning but leave at lunchtime, they're being charged for a full day.

Main Room

• Add a waving hand to the webcam.
• Finish arranging shelves - books organised on them; Bubblino moved onto a shelf; third shelf either shortened to fit on it, or disposed of

new Dinky

• Work out what we're going to do with it :-) Discussion on that is on the NewDinky page.
• There's a chunk of work being planned on the DinkyAVEquipment page to improve the set-up for events

Admin

• Folders for better organisation of receipts, invoices, other paperwork currently in the file system. (AdrianMcEwen finds that date-based folders works well, have a folder for each company year, then you easily know which ones to shred - older than 10 years? - and when you need to look for something you usually know which year it pertains to)
• Build a Membership Database system, which pulls together the online spreadsheet of hot-desk, etc. usage; provides a way to update the doorbots; hooks into FreeAgent to pull in invoice details (to tally with the usage spreadsheet). Also possibly allow a way for members to check how many hot-desk days they've got left and order new invoices. (osfameron is working on something at https://github.com/osfameron/does-register/ with a preview at http://greenokapi.net:5000)
• Build a booking system for the laser cutter. This might be as simple as using something like https://www.google.com/enterprise/marketplace/viewListing?productListingId=4644+7507162898354213825&category=Calendar+%26+Scheduling&query=