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Smartwatches are all the rage these days, with wrists the world over more adorned than they've been since the digital watch heydays of the 1970s and 1980s. Most, though, are far from cheap - which is where Konstantin Dimitrov's Pixie watch comes in. Based around an Arduino Pro Mini board connected to a 12-LED NeoPixel ring, Konstantin - who was behind the DIY non-contact thermometer we covered earlier this year - designed the watch as a do-it-yourself project rather than as a fashion accessory. This is particularly visible in the cardboard casing and thick hook-and-loop strap, but the finished article...

The Arduino platform is a fantastic starting point for learning robotics. Even the smaller and cheaper models are perfectly suited to driving simple wheeled vehicles, and an Arduino Uno coupled with a Bluetooth module is plenty powerful enough for a smartphone-controlled design. Circuit Digest's B. Aswinth Raj has a great example of the Arduino's flexibility in this area in the form of his latest published project: a smart vacuum cleaner based on the same principles as iRobot's popular Roomba range. Where the Roomba is an expensive piece of bespoke equipment, though, Raj's creation is made from plywood, cheap motors, and...

There was a time, not too long ago, when professionally-produced printed circuit boards were available only to businesses willing to place an order for a thousand units or more. Makers eager to move a project from the breadboard were left etching their own one-off designs in acid-filled tanks, or soldering to stripboard and other permanent breadboard analogues. Now, though, companies across the world are eager for maker business and perfectly willing to produce high-quality one-off boards at a low cost - but how do you choose which to trust with your design? As soon as more than one business pops...

When Microsoft announced that Windows 10 would be an Arduino Certified operating system, it wasn't entirely obvious what it meant by that. The Arduino platform has been compatible with Windows since its very first release, and while the company demonstrated that it would be possible to interface a Bluetooth-equipped Arduino microcontroller with a Windows Phone handset it was nothing makers hadn't been doing with third-party applications for years. Now, though, the company's overall goals are more clear. Microsoft has officially announced that Arduino's Wiring syntax is now officially supported by Windows 10 Internet of Things (IoT) Core, its free maker-centric variant...

Although the Arduino is perfectly at home in silly projects like the infamous useless machine, it can serve as a serious tool too. Instructables user Matthias Faust has demonstrated that admirably with his latest project: The Maven Box, a physical controller designed to make software development run more smoothly. Based on an Arduino Uno in an attractive box and communicating with a JavaFX server running on the desktop, Matthias' Maven Box provides physical inputs which act as shortcuts to speed his workflow. Selecting options with a physical knob and switches, plus some attractive push-buttons, Matthias is able to select branches...