Bonus projects should be submitted via email, and critically, with a Piazza post containing a YouTube video demostrating the projet. This way your fellow classmates will see what bonus projects are being done.
The EAGLE CAD design files are found in the Bonus/ directory of the ELEC327 github
repository. Here is a link to the schematic
and one to the
board. Note that
the accelerometer is mis-wired - the MISO and MOSI wires are reversed. You can fix this by
cutting these traces and soldering on airwires.
[1 point for whoever is first] - solder the MSP430 and shift registers onto the board and make all 24 lights light up. Create a youtube video and post to campus. The first timestamped video will be worth 1 bonus point. (Note that there may be a problem with the PCB!)
[1 - 2 points] - implement a clock. This will require that you properly solder the MSP430 and 3 shift register chips. The aesthetics of the clock and code will determine total scorer. Example questions: is there a second hand that ticks? a separate hour and minute hand? is there some sort of PWM-like intensity modulation? does the device calibrate and use the VLO for low power?
[1 point] - create a proof-of-concept accelerometer device (requiring the hardware airwire fix described above). Get data from the accelerometer and display it somehow with the LEDs. (Alternatively, an extra point will be applied for the following bonuses…)
[2 points] - implement a tilt sensor in which the LED closest and furthest from the ground light up. The button should be used to make the device sleep/wake up. This will require that you (a) properly solder the MSP430 and 3 shift register chips to drive the LEDs and (b) interface with the accelerometer to read out the gravity vector, and (c) appropriately compute its direction.
[up to 2 points] - derive optimized integer routines for (1) so that the update speed can be fast. Obviously, this also requires doing (1).
[up to 5 points] - do something cool that links motion to the LEDs.
[2-6 points] - MVP (2 points): after implementing the Lab1 morse code blinking project, connect an input GPIO pin of a second MSP430 to the LED driving pin on the first one (you’ll presumably also need to connect the ground lines). Track the signal on this pin to infer dashes, dots, and spaces. Decode these to characters, which can be viewed in memory in the debugger. Extra points: (a) Implement a serial interface to see the translated characters. (b) Figure out how to synchronize the clock over a large range of frequencies. You can assume that the message is limited to 3-4 letters and repeats for a long time. (c) Use a photodiode or other light sensor to get the signal rather than a wire.
[1-2 points] - Increase the Lab 2 pendant’s battery life by implementing PWM modulation of the LEDs. Note that you will not be able to use the timer module PWM outputs because there aren’t enough / the proper pins are not connected. You might use this for an interesting effect, such as making multiple LEDs light up simultaneously (but with the brightest one following the previous pattern).
[0.5-2 points] - Create some sort of interesting game involving timing and pushing the button. You must implement a long press to send the device into LPM4 (like turning off).
[0.5-1 points] - Implement a 6-sided die. A long press should send the device into LPM4. A short press should cause a random LED to be illuminated. More points will be given for fun “rolling” animations (example - lights spin around or oscillate, and then slow down on the number).
Note that all of these are PCB-related bonuses. You can create a second PCB for Lab 3, or submit these designs as part of the midterm or final project board runs. Alternatively, you could have them manufactured yourself.
[1 point] - Use the 32-pin QFN package of the MSP430 rather than the 20 pin one provided. You will have to find or create a proper EAGLE part for this device, which you should add to the ELEC327 library and generate a pull-request on github.
[1 point] - Add a button to the Thermodot device to be used to go into LPM4 as in Lab 2. You may use a resistor and capacitor to debounce, or implement some sort of software debouncing.
[1-3 points] - Add the necessary components to use this thermistor to measure the temperature of a liquid. Note that you’ll want to make a resistor divider circuit, with your ADC sampling the midpoint of the thermistor and a second resistor whos value you should choose intelligently. Turn your thermodot into a drink temperature alarm, possibly integrated into a cup. (For example, if the liquid is too hot to drink, display a red color and flash.) A useful device would probably also have a power button as described above.
[0.25 - 0.5 points] - Make nice Youtube video showing your Simon game in action. Make sure that “Rice” and “ELEC327” are in the tile or otherwise searchable. Your demo video should show you playing through to a win, running the “Game Over - Win” animation, and then pushing a button to restart and then playing through but making a mistake to generate the “Game Over - Loss” animation. More points will be given for higher production quality, humor, or other aesthetics.
[0.5 - 1 point each] - Possible improvements or modifications for Simon: