#also he really wanted to play with the flashlight like it was a laser pointer

[tj-crochets]

I made a new friend! He’s my neighbor’s cat and he really really wanted me to let him in the door

[queen-arabella-of-cordonia]

I posted a while back that my emotional support kitty had cancer and that we had been informed his time left with us was limited. Unfortunately, yesterday morning he crossed the Rainbow Bridge and I just wanted to write something to commemorate him.

His name was Midnight and I adopted him in 2005 when he was just a few weeks old. Even then he had a mischievious personality and I thought he was the most special cat I had ever seen. I have other cats, and I have had many cats over the years that I still love dearly, but I've never had the soul bond with them that I had with Midnight.

He was all black as a kitten, but as he grew he developed little white spots that marked him as a very handsome tuxedo cat. He had a patch of white fur under his neck and on his belly, and he had little tufts of white fur between the toes on his paws. His fur eventually turned brown, as he spent many happy years laying in the sunniest spots he could find. He still had areas, like his ears, that were all black but the majority of his fur really lightened over the years.

He was absolutely and positively my very best friend. I am so very grateful for all of the time I spent with him. We had so many good years together. He loved playing with the wrapping paper and bows on Christmas morning. He also loved playing with Easter grass too. Yes, I know that can be dangerous for cats so he always had extremely vigilant supervision for it, but he just loved playing with anything that could be construed as any type of string-

He loved cuddling always but especially at bedtime.

He loved chasing all kinds of lights. He liked it when we played with him with laser pointers and flashlights. He would run and chase them every time we played. Even if the sun was coming through a window and reflecting off an electronic screen, it was a light to be chased. All to say, strings and lights were his favorite. All of the toys we bought him with feathers or little mice at the end to chase were nowhere near as interesting to him as the string they were tied to.

The entire time I was in college, he "helped ". He loved playing with my pens and laying on my books or my laptop to get my attention. He really should've earned a degree of his own both times I graduated because he was right there with me the whole time.

We shared many little meals together. For a long time, Subway was his favorite. He knew what the bag and paper wrapped around the sandwiches sounded like! I always gave him little pieces of the meat off my sandwich. He also liked to share chicken, which I eat pretty often. Every holiday I would bring him his own little pieces of the big turkeys and ham and he loved it. If he was sleeping anywhere else, he would come sit with me at dinner because he knew I always shared what I had with him. By the end he couldn't eat people food or even his favorite dry cat food, which was super sad.

🐾🐾🐾🐾🐾🐾🐾🐾🐾🐾🐾🐾🐾

All of his illness was so sad for me, and I tried so very hard to care for him. He had dental issues that we maybe could've fixed with surgery, but he also had cancer that spread really fast at the end. It was on his face, right over the area where he had dental complications. His age, along with the combination of health issues, put further treatment options out of reach. We could have sent off tissue to be biopsied and maybe started chemo and radiation for the cancer- but even if that bought him more time, he still would've had to then endure dental surgery too. Surgery is complicated for elderly cats and he was 16 1/2 years old. I know his mouth hurt so much, and he would've been miserable in chemotherapy. We have a wonderful, compassionate vet, and he agreed that at his age and with his conditions, keeping him comfortable was our best option. I gave him medicine for his pain that I hope helped. The cancer spread fast these last 2 months and he lost his vision, completely in his right eye and partially in his left. He trusted me to the end to watch out for him and keep him safe, and I will always second guess the decisions I had to make. None of us can really win the inevitable battle against nature, time, and death though.

When he went yesterday morning, they gave him a sedative and I held him in my arms until he fell asleep. I know he knew that I was there for him. Once he was asleep, they gave him the shot that sent him over the Rainbow Bridge. I petted him and told him I loved him over and over when he left. I told him I was so proud of him because he had been so brave since he got sick. I told him he was my best friend. I've been telling him that for years, and although I know he didn't understand the words, he always purred more when I said it, so he must've liked the tone of voice I always said it in. I swear I felt his soul leave his body.

I know in my heart it was the right thing to do, but I already miss him so, so much. I have lost many pets and family members before, even had 2 very near death experiences myself, and I don't think any of those losses came close to what I'm feeling now. Please, if you've read this far, if you have any fur babies please hug them extra in Midnight's memory today and always because our time with them is fleeting and soon gone.

So here's to my special boy, my very best friend who purred as loud as a motorcycle, and my very sweet love who I was so very lucky to be blessed with. I hope now he's not hurting and he is somewhere that he can eat the food he likes, find strings to chew on, and bask in the sunshine again. I will love him every single day for the rest of my life.

Until we meet again best friend. 🐾

[that-foul-legacy-lover]

This is probably going to be long asf, I'm so sorry-

Me reading mothman acting like a cat gave me a brain rot to actually make him a cat or at least part cat LOL. Disclaimer: I never had a cat before so these can be inaccurate.

Brain Rot:

You have no idea what happened, but now you have a giant of a cat/moth hybrid or whatever on your hands. He had gone out to get fresh air and he came back like this. The catlike traits he had before were also amplified significantly. He purred and mrrped a lot more but he also now hisses a lot when he doesn’t like something or someone and he is more willing to claw at any threats he perceives. You also noticed that he looks out the window a lot more, fixated on prey like birds. He would also chase around any lasers you used to play with him as well as doing zoomies at any time of the day. You forced him to go outside more and do zoomies there since he absolutely wrecked the floors with his claws and you don’t have any carpets or rugs to cover the skid marks anymore. On the note of being outside, he would nap more in the sun. You would be pulled closer if you get close enough and he won’t let go for a while. He would purr contently and if you tried to move he would whine. You also now had more floof to play with, like his soft ears and tail. You don’t touch his tail often though because it is super sensitive to touch and the few times you did more than a feather-light touch, he had hissed and clawed at you. He felt so bad afterward though, whining and having his ears pinned back. He built some pillow forts for you to be comfy and would try to do everything for you to make up for it. He’s not going to forgive himself for a while, distancing himself in fear he’ll hurt you again just for a simple thing. If you innate touch, he would freeze in place and stay still until you’re out of the room again.

Drabble/Scenario: Intro/Finding him

You would stare blankly at him, now processing the cat traits he now had to his appearances like the ears and tail. You even noticed little toe beans that were on the underside of his claws so they now resemble more like paws. He was basking contently in the sun, even stretching like a cat once in a while. Your mouth open and shut, thinking about what may have changed other than the physical appearance...  He seems to have the habit of basking in the sun that cats do. And he already did zoomies, chasing lights, and making cat-like sounds before. So maybe this will not be that big of a change? You would approach, hoping that he was feeling alright. “Ajax?” His ears would perk up at that but he didn’t move. You would come closer and touched his ears. He mrrped and nuzzled his face against your hand, his tail swishing contently. He would purr and you can feel the vibrations even through his fur. He would seem to be more clingy right now, pulling you in and curling around you, purring. You noticed his tail swishing and resisted the urge to grab it. You would try to move but he wouldn’t allow it, holding on tighter and whining. “Hey come on… We need to go, it’s nearly time to eat and I’m hungry. Please?” Your tummy would rumble, furthering your point. Ajax would reluctantly get up but still clung to you. He wouldn’t want you to starve after all. There was sudden rustling and he held you closer with one arm, deep growling escaping his throat. You can feel the vibration from where you were against his chest. His floof was poofed up and bristled, his tailed swayed and his ears twitched every second. Soon, slimes would appear but he made short work of them with his free claw. He would soon walk back towards your place, wanting you to be safe

Drabble/Scenario: Touch

You were watching him with the overwhelming want to touch his floof. To be more specific, his toe beans, ears, and tail. However, you had no idea how he would react since he was still unused to them. He was sprawled out in his room, the window letting in sunlight and he was basking. You quietly tiptoed over to him, touching his toe beans. He jolted and looked at you before settling down again, trusting that you weren't trying to do anything funny. You were playing with them like how a child would play with their parent's hands. He would be purring, finding your actions cute. You would then slowly reach up and gently touch his ears, they were super soft. You were watching him to make sure that he was ok with it and he was after the initial shock. You were enjoying it and it seemed like he was as well. He was purring loudly, his eye closed in content. There was now one last thing for you to try and touch, his tail. You were nervous since you knew that the tail is more sensitive than the other places on a cat and you didn’t want to stress him out. You went to touch his tail but it swang into your hand, making you grab it on reflex. He lashed out at that point, claws sinking into your flesh and drawing out crimson. When he realized what he had done, he would run out and over to Bubu pharmacy. Thankfully Baizhu was there to patch you up and he would stay by your side every second, whining and crying to himself. The wounds looked so bad and it looked like you lost a lot of blood. He would have never forgiven himself if you never woke up. Thankfully, a few days later you did. He was there but he was extremely gentle and kept his distance. He holed himself in his room, not wanting to face you due to how bad he felt. He only came out because you begged him with tears in your eyes.

Drabble: His antics

You were boredly playing with a laser pointer you had while he was looking out the window at the birds chirping. He was tensed up, wanting to pounce but he knew that the window was in between them. His instincts were making him hyper focus on everything outside making a noise. A bird would fly too close and there was a thunk as he tried to grab it, only hitting the glass. “What are you doing? You do realize there’s glass right?” He whined, knowing already but he had the urge to grab the bird regardless. His eyes then landed on the red dot. You would laugh into your hand as you would point it around, him chasing after it. He was such a goofball, but he was your goofball. You would play with him more and more, careful to direct him away from breakable things. After playing, you would make dinner for the both of you and then cuddle together. After a while, you would get ready for bed and turn in. You curled up in your bed/blanket nest, snoozing softly. The window curtains were open, illuminating you with the moonlight, making you look ethereal. Your roommate was tossing and turning before he got up and paced, restless. He couldn’t sleep and he wanted to go to sleep already. He would then open the door and go into the hallway. He would then start to do zoomies, enjoying the rush that it gave him. His claws would dig into the floor as he would skid due to some lost frictions however he managed not to crash into anything. His thundering footsteps awoke you from your slumber though. You would get up from the nest, hugging the life sized narwhal plush you had and then went to the doorway. You would soon see him nyooming across the hallway more. “I’m too tired for this…” You would go back to bed and after you fell asleep and he finished with his zoomies, he would join you in the nest.

- 🖊 anon

*waves magic wand* i cast spell of have more brainrots on you >:)c

c-cat,,,,,,, i love cats so much they're so fluffy and sweet,,,,, cat mothman would 100% drape himself over you even more, only now he's fluffier and more flexible, like liquid.

OH what if when he accidentally hurt you and you asked him to come back he'd gently lick the wounds and your tears!! as a way of apologizing more and contributing to your healing process in his own way <33

IDEA IDEA you know how cats' eyes dilate when they see something they love?? Childe doesn't really have a pupil but maybe his eye glows a bit brighter!! so when he looks at you it's almost like a flashlight, casting a warm glow over both of you as you snuggle together <33 he'd also definitely pull you down for naps in the sun, except he doesn't really sleep, instead opting to nuzzle your face and hair and purr as you pet his ears

[ilianakonna-blog]

Loro’s mounted wheelchair assistant puts high tech to work for people with disabilities

A person with physical disabilities can’t interact with the world the same way as the able, but there’s no reason we can’t use tech to close that gap.  Loro  is a device that mounts to a wheelchair and offers its occupant the ability to see and interact with the people and things around them in powerful ways.

 Loro’s camera and app work together to let the user see farther, read or translate writing, identify people, gesture with a laser pointer and more. They demonstrated their tech onstage today during Startup Battlefield at TechCrunch Disrupt Berlin.

    Invented by a team of mostly students who gathered at Harvard’s Innovation Lab, Loro began as a simple camera for disabled people to more easily view their surroundings.

 “We started this project for our friend Steve,” said Loro co-founder and creative director, Johae Song. A designer like her and others in their friend group, he was diagnosed with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, or ALS, a degenerative neural disease that paralyzes the muscles of the afflicted. “So we decided to come up with ideas of how to help people with mobility challenges.”

 “We started with just the idea of a camera attached to the wheelchair, to give people a panoramic view so they can navigate easily,” explained co-founder David Hojah. “We developed from that idea after talking with mentors and experts; we did a lot of iterations, and came up with the idea to be smarter, and now it’s this platform that can do all these things.”

 It’s not simple to design responsibly for a population like ALS sufferers and others with motor problems. The problems they may have in everyday life aren’t necessarily what one would think, nor are the solutions always obvious. So the Loro team determined to consult many sources and expend a great deal of time in simple observation.

 “Very basic observation — just sit and watch,” Hojah said. “From that you can get ideas of what people need without even asking them specific questions.”

     Others would voice specific concerns without suggesting solutions, such as a flashlight the user can direct through the camera interface.

 “People didn’t say, ‘I want a flashlight,’ they said ‘I can’t get around in the dark.’ So we brainstormed and came up with the flashlight,” he said. An obvious solution in some ways, but only through observation and understanding can it be implemented well.

 The focus is always on communication and independence, Song said, and users are the ones who determine what gets included.

 “We brainstorm together and then go out and user test. We realize some features work, others don’t. We try to just let them play with it and see what features people use the most.”

 There are assistive devices for motor-impaired people out there already, Song and Hojah acknowledged, but they’re generally expensive, unwieldy and poorly designed. Hojah’s background is in medical device design, so he knows of what he speaks.

 Consequently, Loro has been designed to be as accessible as possible, with a tablet interface that can be navigated using gaze tracking (via a Tobii camera setup) or other inputs like joysticks and sip-and-puff tubes.

     The camera can be directed to, for example, look behind the wheelchair so the user can safely back up. Or it can zoom in on a menu that’s difficult to see from the user’s perspective and read the items off. The laser pointer allows a user with no ability to point or gesture to signal in ways we take for granted, such as choosing a pastry from a case. Text to speech is built right in, so users don’t have to use a separate app to speak out loud.

 The camera also tracks faces and can recognize them from a personal (though for now, cloud-hosted) database for people who need help tracking those with whom they interact. The best of us can lose a name or fail to place a face — honestly, I wouldn’t mind having a Loro on my shoulder during some of our events.

           Right now the team is focused on finalizing the hardware; the app and capabilities are mostly finalized but the enclosure and so on need to be made production-ready. The company itself is very early-stage — they just incorporated a few months ago and worked with $100,000 in pre-seed funding to create the prototype. Next up is doing a seed round to get ready to manufacture.

 “The whole team, we’re really passionate about empowering these people to be really independent, not just waiting for help from others,” Hojah said. Their driving force, he made clear, is compassion.

  [gallery ids=“1752219,1752224,1752228,1752229,1752230″]

https://techcrunch.com/2018/11/29/loros-mounted-wheelchair-assistant-puts-high-tech-to-work-for-the-disabled/

[iamanartisttype]

Is Dawn of War Soulstorm really so bad?

Soulstorm is definitely the black sheep within the crop of the Dawn of War games. It was the one expansion Relic had nothing to do with. They were busy working on Dawn of War 2. That left Iron Lore Entertainment to do the job. Some will say they did a horrendous job and others say they did okay. I personally think they did better than people give them credit for. Given that they’d never made a strategy game, especially one as niche as DoW, and the only game they’d made was Titan Quest, an action role playing game, and an expansion for it. I’m willing to pull back some of the blame for inexperience. So, how did they do?

I’ll start off with the gameplay. Having been playing it for the last few weeks, I have to say at times it’s both better and worse than Dark Crusade. It’s superior since it adds two more races and gives them their unique roles and playstyles in the game. I have to give them this point for doing so well with the new races. The worse comes in with the gameplay itself. The controlling of the units can be a bit off.

The Sisters of Battle are where they should be as a mix between the Imperial Guard and the Space Marines. They also have the attribute of powers given to them through their faith. The powers are there to offset the lack of a super tank and elite infantry. They do have the saint, but because they’re like the Guard and Marines, they only get one or the other. The saint was good enough for what they do. They’re a  much better armed horde army with the boost of FIRE, lots of fire to cleanse the impure, and to also break morale. It’s an interesting concept that brings the player back to the basics of the game where morale breaking is your best friend. It’s the saints best friend too.

The Dark Eldar, much like the normal Eldar are just infuriating. A different kind of infuriating. They go a lot further into the blood, guts and gore of combat while the normal Eldar are clean and quick. That’s really it. The Dark eldar are just darker slave trading Eldar with some interesting warp powers that will build up over the course of a game to make up for the fact that like the normal Eldar they’re underpowered in the early game.

I hate the Dark and normal Eldar, so that’s fine with me, but from a balance standpoint they’re pretty weak. They are movement races, so it could just be my lack of experience with them in this regard. I am a Guard player after all. Staying stationary is what we do best. We die standing.

Here’s where the chinks in the armor start to show up. The gameplay itself is lacking in comparison to Dark Crusade. There’s a weird bug where I’ll tell my guys to go in one direction and they’ll take an off route. If a base is right in front of them they’ll attempt to go around it instead of into it. It only occurs when I’m attack moving, but it has messed me up on occasion and given the enemy a superior position.

Otherwise, the combat feels lifeless. I don’t get this rush during combat that I once did. In the previous games when you entered combat it was an epic battle. Tanks firing ordnance into melee skirmishes with gunfire galore flying all around. Now it all just feels stale. I feel like this is for two reasons.

I’m used to the combat by now. It’s been a game and three expansion packs. It makes sense I’d grow tired of it, but I’m not tired of the other games. Winter Assault, to me, still has the most epic feel when it comes to combat. I think that’s because of the second reason.

The games been so streamlined by this point. You can only have X amount of this troop while the rest of your troops are barebones basic. Winter Assault allowed me to field any kind of army to combat whatever was in front of me. Orks? Break out the hellhounds. Space Marines? Chimeras with lots of Kasrkan with plasma guns. Eldar? Ogryn tended to do the job right. Chaos required a mixture of hellhounds and chimeras. There was so many ways to field an army. Now it’s two Russ’s, three Basilisks, one Kasrkan and one Ogryn squad. I do get a couple of bombers and heavy weapons teams, but it was more fun when I could field an entire elite army. Now, it’s just Guardsman.

I’ll move onto looks now. The game definitely looks prettier with it’s uptick in graphics. The expansion packs have all added to the graphical fidelity of the base game. Especially with Dark Crusade that brought in 1920 by 1080p resolution. If you’re like me and own the games outside of steam the updates are not easy to comeby without risk. If I was to take one shot at steam, It’d be that, but old games are just that, old.  

The problem with the look of Soulstorm is that it’s too clean. Look at Dark Crusade, Winter Assault and the base game's campaign. The maps were grainy and dark with a lot of history behind them. This is supposed to be a war torn system from years of battle between the orks and guard, why isn’t it shown? You see it in in the previous installments. The world of Tartarus and it’s dead Guard and demolished cities, Lorn V with Its Guard inhabitants eradicated, It’s Chaos and Orks inhabitants strewn about fighting each other with a massive destroyed base of operations just ready for the winner to claim. It looks to have a massive amount of history to it everywhere as you march through it with your army to take it back. Dark Crusade has the feel of a guard/Tau planet in that they weren’t really fighting until everyone showed up, which is fluff friendly. The Kauraven planets feel like noone was there fighting, ever. You’ll find a couple of areas if you look hard enough, but most of the areas are squeaky clean. It doesn’t feel grimdark.

There’s also an odd mesh of the tabletop terrain with the game's background. It comes off as eye popping in some areas. The destroyed buildings just don’t mix with the pretty foliage that looks like it has not been affected in any way by the war torn years of strife.

Sound and ambience I’ll summarize quickly. It’s stellar just like the rest of the series. The new tracks of the holy organs really capture what the Sisters of Battle are fighting for. Their scorching xenos filth in the name of their glorious God Emperor. I much prefer the chanting and war drums laced with flashlights/laser pointers, but that's me. The Dark Eldar’s soundtrack is just menacing, evil and extremely epic. It truly reflects who the Dark Eldar are. If you don’t know then go and look up their history. Don’t if you’re against pure sin.

Now I come to the story. The story is pretty much the first game with a cluster of extra races thrown in. Orks and Guard and are fighting each other for control of the sector. Obviously, that’s a secondary goal for the Orks, but it helps their primary goal of “fightin” and “winnin”. Then all of that changes when near every single other race attacks. Once they’re all there a massive warp storm traps them all in and their left to fend each other off. It’s not entirely like the first game, but it’s close.

It’s not a top notch story that truly exceeds either of Winter Assault or the base game's story. What it is is a typical tuesday for Warhammer 40k. Everyone killing each other off in the most brutal of fashions and only the strongest can come out on top. Who wins? You’ll have to judge that yourself. Unless you want a lore winner, that's where you find out the lore is quite fond of a certain blogger. Too bad everyone hates this game.

The last thing I'll look at is the voice acting. Honestly, this aspect of the game gets far more scrutiny than it deserves. The only voices that hit me the wrong way were Commander Boreale, who just sounds off. He sounds as if he came from an entirely different universe and can barely get into the way Space Marines talk. It’s just offputting. The other voice is Gorgutz, I am so used to his original voice being hammy and amazing in representing the Orks perfectly. Hearing him talk like he just smoked his voice away just saddens me. One other complaint with the voice acting, the characters hardly intermigle. You got a mixture of everything in Dark Crusade. Everyone had something to say to each other and here it’s just everyone talking amongst themselves. It’s not as fun when there’s no banter involved. As bad as Gorgutz and Boreale sound, I bet some banter would have helped out the situation.

Looking back I didn’t have the hate that some others have towards it. I treated it as a lesser expansion than the rest, but it was still good and that hasn’t changed. Being older and more experienced with games and being far more observant, I have to say I found a lot more problems than I used to see. To me, the weakest part of the game is the feel to it. I don’t feel these worlds are as wartorn as was presented. They just seem like a little bit of war happened. Both the Orks and Guard had been stalemating for years and now everything else has shown up and are wiping each other out. It just needed to be shown more.. Everything else wrong with it can be overlooked slightly since it was Iron Lore’s first and only crack. I feel like if given another shot they’d have hit the mark. The gameplay had very little problems and the banter they’d have picked up on if given more time in the world. The voice acting wasn't perfect, but the marks that had to be hit with the new races were spot on.

Give it a shot if you haven’t. It’s still worth a playthrough or two.

Thank you very much for reading!

May the Emperor guide your blade.

[thecoroutfitters]

Written by R. Ann Parris on The Prepper Journal.

I love modern technology, particularly the electronics that allow me to communicate so quickly and easily. Even so, the loss of that capability – for whatever reason it’s lost – doesn’t have to be entirely devastating. We communicate not only without our electronics, but without noise all the time.

//

I tap my wrist, hold up my hand with my fingers splayed. Across a room, instantly, I’ve told someone they have five minutes, or that I need/want five minutes. I tap beside my eyes, point in a general direction, and then point lower or higher in an aisle of a store. It tells somebody at the other end that I found what we’re looking for, or that I want them to look at something, and then where more specifically that something is.

We do it nearly instinctively, some of us more than others. While hand gestures especially change meaning culture to culture, the ability to communicate without speaking is inherent to our species. It has been since before the first cave painting.

Recently the topic of communication without radios came up. The possible reasons for a non-radio life are pretty varied – a generator or solar panels with significant damage, low winter light, extended-time crisis when even rechargeable batteries are exhausted, seasons and locations when it’s hard to get messages through, EMPs and solar storms, neighbors who have the skills to survive but don’t have the same EMP-proof stockpiles we do, newer homesteaders and preppers who can survive but haven’t moved into serious “thrive” supplies yet.

There are also times we want to communicate, but don’t necessarily want to be heard. Hunting and tactical reasons are two of those.

History and modern technology have given us a lot of options to work around those possibilities and needs. Here are a few.

Morse

Morse code can be applied to a lot of communication options. While it’s primarily associated with radios, it was once a common ship-to-ship and ship-to-shore communication method using light instead.

Navy signalman using Morse –

It wasn’t until I started looking for an image online that I realized how dependent people are on the blinker-clicker features of their flashlights for light-transmitted Morse. If you have a milspec light that can take that abuse, great.

If not, cover and uncover your flashlight with your hand.  It’s still fast and easy.

For some of us with broken and aging fingers, and for people who are turning their lights on and off to get the same effect, it’s not only actually easier, sometimes faster, it’s also going to save your light a lot of wear and tear.

You can use a laser pointer for it as well, or cover and uncover a battery-candle-oil lantern with a box (or an oatmeal tub, coffee can, small ones with your hand).

Containing Light

Light stands out like it’s cool at night. Even a little green-red-blue laser light. It travels a long way when it’s dark-dark.

If you’re only trying to not stand out to everybody with one of those insane fifty-yard beams and you’re working from a set, expected position, you can signal by flashing the laser light or a flashlight into your palm or onto your chest, onto a tree or certain wall that’s visible from another location but not most of the property.

If you anticipate the need to really not be seen by anybody but your LOS partner, carry a flattened toilet paper roll wrapped around your small flashlight. (Flattened but tube, not sliced.)

When you’re ready to send a message back to the house, to the other side of a building, along the length of a wall, or down a roadway, cup the tube in one hand so you’re blocking the back, and stick the front of the light just inside it. Or, hold a laser sight/pointer just outside it.

The roll contains the light, so only somebody facing you sees it. If you want, add a mirror or a white disk to the palm to make it a little easier for that person to see.

I pretty much prefer those two general methods, regardless, because you stand a really good chance of blinding the person you’re trying to signal, or at least giving them dots in the eyes, especially with a pointer.

  Ship Flags

The sea services have been using specific flags to communicate since some of the earliest days, from pirates warning about trying to run from them, warning others that illnesses are aboard, to requesting assistance. This site has a list of international signal flags, their phonetic name, and the navy/maritime meanings.

The phonetic name becomes valuable, because some of the meanings at sea translate directly or with minor modification to things we face on land, too. The Morse, semaphore, or ASL of the phonetic name can be flashed or signed to convey a whole thought or message, just as a flag would.

The flags can be made – painted on boards or drawn on cards to use in windows or to be flashed, or drawn in chalk on a wall or sidewalk as needed. It doesn’t have  to be fabric, or flying in the air.

Any flag, banner, or windsock at all can be part of group and neighbor communication.

If we all normally fly the local team’s colors, but somebody puts it at half-mast or upside down, they could be saying they need help – or they’re ready for harvest/planting assistance. One person with a weather station might say rain, so a blue banner goes up. A black cross on yellow might mean a woman went into labor and the local sheep keeper would be welcome as a midwife. A black dot might mean there’s sickness – don’t come calling.

A flag might also just mean all’s well here, and a quick snip to drop it on the way past alerts all the rest that the gunfire wasn’t practice, it’s real, or that there’s a fire-fire, not burning waste or smoking out bees.

We can get as creative or simple as we want.

Semaphore Flagging

Another powerful tool in the box for sending messages visually, with the same alpha-numeric capabilities of Morse, is semaphore signaling – that signalman out there with the two bright flags or cone lights. Semaphore flag signaling was also once done using a single flag in just four positions (you can find it called wigwag signaling as well).

  With two flags, there are fewer combinations to remember, but you also have to have two flags – and hands – available. For both, a larger line-of-sight space is required so the flags can be seen.

Established Shorthand Codes

Radio Q codes  and 10 codes have a lot of value for quickly sending messages.

Various established codes provide shorthand communication for “Suspicious vehicle” (10-37), “your keying is hosed and hit every branch of the ugly tree on its way down” (QSD), “Report to [location]” (10-25), “stand by” (QRX), and “Be super-duper quiet” (“Do not use siren or flashers”) (10-40).

Those are all phrases we might use, from communicating across a yard or across a farm, as a simple survivor with a neighbor or family, or as a group with defensive and patrol forces. 10-codes especially have a lot of preexisting elements that are of use in many situations.

They can be transmitted with clicks, whistles, a pipe smacked with a hammer, marker on a dry erase board, flashed/blinker lights, or using semaphore flag(s) and hand signals.

We can also easily modify or truncate existing codes.

“QRO” (are you troubled by static noise) can become “do you hear anything”.

10-81 (breathalyzer report) becomes “just a drunk”.

10-90 (bank alarm) can become a prefacing code for an audio or visual alarm, with the location following it.

As with cop and amateur radio codes, there are hospital codes that can apply or be readily modified to fit life without radio communication. Heavy equipment operators and divers also have signals we can steal and modify. Knowing the common motorcyclist signals can be applied to daily life as well as serious disasters.

Military Hand Signals

Whether we’re ever planning to clear a house or a yard with another person or not, military and police hand signals also have applications for many situations. The numbers alone are useful. There are also action-information signals that are pretty handy.

The difference between “stop” and “freeze” gets used with my dumb dog 20 and 200 feet from our house with some regularity. I prefer to just go extract her or the ball from my pots and planters, but sometimes I just want her to stay generally where she is while a car passes. “Go back” translates to “out/away” in our world – I want her to back away from me, usually while I’m playing with sharp things or might squish her.

I originally thought it was just my quirky father telling dogs, the rest of the family, and hunting buddies that we were going to the vehicle with his “steering wheel” gesture. For a while I though the military had stolen the “down” signal from hunters with dogs.

Turned out, not so much. He just modified them from his military days.

Even without need for silence, it’s just really easy to whistle or clap a hand once, tap a window, ring a triangle, and then make a quick gesture, as opposed to shouting fifteen times or hiking out to somebody.

The gestures themselves are rooted in military hand signals we each learned (decades apart). In most of my lifetime’s applications of them, they’ve had no military bearing at all. But like the ability to say “I love you” a last time from a window, or immediately flag a distress signal in a boating-savvy community, they entered into our world and stayed in use.

ASL

American sign language has some of the same benefits as the everyday-everyone useful military signals. There are a world’s worth of truncated single-gesture shorthand signs, for everything from “man” or “female child” to “taking lunch”.  Deaf-mute people are able to hold the same sophisticated conversation as speaking and hearing folks. The addition of spelling and broader concepts to military hand signals allows ASL signers to be more specific across even distance, silently.

It’s also just a handy skill to have and might increase your employability when you stick it on a resume.

Written Word

As with flags and hand signals, we can take cues from history and modern eras with leaving drawn symbols – or flashing cards and posters – as well.

Here’s a fairly comprehensive listing of WWII symbols. It wouldn’t be completely crazy talk to go with another nation’s symbols, such as German or Russian, if you want to keep the information a little more segmented, although there tends to be a lot of commonality.

The old hobo symbols can be a little tricky. I can think of three or four for “safe water” alone. It also means adjusting from “black spot of death” and “X marks the spot” to slashes and X’s are bad, and dots are good.

However, from “dangerous man” and “vicious dogs” to “rickety bridge” or “avoid this in rain”, there are many apply, whether we’re planning on a community, thinking “Kilroy” situations, or just making notes for family or a core group.

The symbols also allow us to quickly and easily annotate our own maps for areas of concern or resources.

Limitations

The limitation to all of these is line of sight. But in some to many cases, being able to communicate even from a driveway to the house, the length of a hall, or stacked in a ditch, without making noise or taking a lot of time, makes them worth considering. There’s a good reason many of them have never faded from use, even with today’s technology.

If you want to communicate at range in the dark, you’ll need flashlights or pointers, (or oil-candle lanterns if your non-radio needs are expected due to long-duration interruptions in shipping). For us, that’s balanced, because we have lights on us, almost always, but not always a cell signal and not always a radio. That might not hold true for everyone.

Hand and flag signals are limited in range, while light carries longer distance. However, blinker-light comms is only really reliable at night. I may be able to use red boards, car windshield heat reflectors, or white flags to increase range in the daytime.

The number-one piece of gear for longer-distance communication without electronics is going to be binoculars or a scope.

Day or night, if I can’t see what you’re sending, clearly, we have delays or miscommunication. They’re inexpensive enough and should be part of most preparedness closets anyway.

If you’re mostly in brush country and are only talking about distances of double-digit yards, don’t break the bank there – there are more important things. If you’re looking at using blinker lights and somebody climbing a windmill or water tower daily or weekly to do a neighborhood-town flag check, a simple scope should work.

It’s also a lot to learn.

Instead of planning to use all of them, maybe take notes, print guides, but cherry pick. The very basic hand signals (heard, saw, numbers, armed or unarmed, child, adult, animal, danger, recover/relax, say again) and basic Morse code would take priority. 10 and Q codes can be added on. A few flags or graphics to represent ideas or situations follow.

Radio Silence Backups

The point is not to discourage anyone with fifty-five million more things to learn or buy. It’s that we have lots of options even if electronics-driven communication becomes unavailable. With any luck, there are some ideas here that can add some resiliency and redundancy to existing plans.

And, since a lot of it is learning based, not resource based, non-radio comms can be a way to improve preparedness with free-inexpensive skill building while saving up for purchases.

If you liked this article, please rate it.

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The post Radio Silence – Communication Without Electronics appeared first on The Prepper Journal.

from The Prepper Journal Don't forget to visit the store and pick up some gear at The COR Outfitters. How prepared are you for emergencies? #SurvivalFirestarter #SurvivalBugOutBackpack #PrepperSurvivalPack #SHTFGear #SHTFBag

[awkwardlyamusing-blog]

10 tech gadgets for your pets

New Post has been published on http://doggietrainingclasses.com/10-tech-gadgets-for-your-pets/

10 tech gadgets for your pets

Can you put a price on love? Well, for Americans it’s almost $70 billion.

We’re talking about our love of pets. According to a survey by the American Pet Products Association, U.S. pet owners spent $69.51 billion on pet products in 2017.

If you’re eager to buy some tech gadgets for your dog Rover or your cat Fluffy, we have you covered. Here are 10 gadgets we found that can keep your pets entertained, well behaved and always in sight.

With your Furbo Dog Camera, you can livestream video to your phone so you can monitor your pet whenever you’re not at home. This is great for indoor pets.

With two-way audio, Furbo’s barking sensor will send barking push notifications to your smartphone when it detects barking. Using your phone you can talk to your dog to calm them down and stop the barking.

And if Fido is being a good boy, the Furbo will toss him a treat. Just fill the Furbo with your dogs’ favorite treats via the free Furbo app for iOS and Android.

It’s not like you want to create a surveillance state for your dog, but let’s face it, indoor pets can do quite a bit of damage when they’re home alone. Petcube Play 2 Smart Pet Camera has a built-in Alexa that is triggered by sound and motion and you can check through your smartphone to see what your pet is up to.

Two-way audio allows you to hear and speak to your pet from your phone. You can say hello and let them know you love them or tell them to knock it off if they are up to no good.

The Petcube Play 2 also has a built-in interactive pet-safe laser toy that can be controlled by your phone. On your phone, touch the spot in your room or swipe across the screen and the laser will follow your finger in real-time. It’s a great way to get your pet exercising.

I love my cat, but whenever I have a flashlight or a laser pointer in my hand I just can’t help watching her running around trying to catch the light. Obviously, I’m not the only one who likes to do this because that’s exactly what the PetSafe Zoom rotating laser cat toy does.

It uses two lasers that rotate 360 degrees so multiple cats can chase the lights. The Zoom operates with minimal electronic sounds so even the timidest of cats can enjoy chasing the laser lights.

Powered by three AAA batteries all you have to do is press the on/off button. The Zoom automatically shuts off after 15 minutes so your cats don’t get over-stimulated.

If your dog loves to play fetch but you’re not at home or you just don’t want to play along, the iFetch Interactive Ball Launcher lets your dog play fetch to their hearts’ content. The iFetch comes in sizes to suit large and small dogs.

Once tennis balls are placed into the top of the iFetch, the product throws the ball 10, 25 or 40 feet. The iFetch for large dogs uses standard-size tennis balls while the model for smaller dogs uses smaller tennis balls for tiny mouths.

You will have to set aside some time to train your dog to drop the ball back into the iFetch so they can keep the fun going.

If your dog is a barker that is annoying neighbors, the HoomDirect Anti Barking Device may be just what you need. The anti-barking device has three range levels of ultrasonic sound to disrupt barking.

The ultrasonic frequency is not harmful to pets and is completely inaudible to humans. It’s a great training tool for your dog or even your neighbor’s noisy dog.

The device is designed like a birdhouse and you can hang or mount it on a tree, wall or fence post. You should be aware that the effectiveness of this device depends on your dog’s age, hearing ability and temperament.

One of my dogs gets anxious when he hears thunder, firecrackers and the like. My other dog tends to get aggressive and protective.

Believe it or not, there is actually a New Agey product to soothe their nerves. The Agon CozyVest includes a music player, lavender and chamomile essential oil crystals and is adjustable so it can provide the right pressure for your dog.

Along with calming your dog when there are loud sounds, the vest helps with separation anxiety, travel, vet visits and more. It’s also good for preventing nonstop barking, aggression, and fighting.

No training or medication is needed. Just put the vest on your pup. It’s also considered great for rescue dogs.

How many of us have left the TV or radio on to comfort your pets at home when we’re away? Try the iCalmDog speaker that comes pre-loaded with four hours of special music.

It’s BioAcoustically re-arranged music that can help relieve canine anxiety by creating a warm and safe-feeling home. The music auto-repeats for continuous play.

Most of us don’t let our dogs wander around the neighborhood. It’s dangerous and you’re just asking for animal control to give Rover some time behind bars.

But, let’s face it. If a dog really wants to get out, she’ll find a way — as my chewed up wooden fence can attest. That’s where the Whistle 3 / GPS Pet Tracker & Activity Monitor comes very much in handy.

Whistle can pinpoint your pet’s location with its SMART GPS activity tracker anywhere that AT&T 3G cellular service is available. You even get text or email notifications letting you know your dog left the yard.

The tracker attaches to any harness or collar and can be used on pets that weigh more than 8 pounds. Whistle also monitors your pet’s daily activities so you can see how she measures up to other dogs her age, weight, and breed.

If you have an outdoor kitty, here’s a way she can go outside and keep other critters out of your home. The SureFlap Microchip Cat Flap uses RFID to read your cat’s ID microchip, allowing your cat to come in and out of the house.

SureFlap learns up to 32 identities so unwanted strays don’t wander into your home. Programmable collar tags are sold separately for cats without microchips.

SureFlap works with nine, 10 and 15-digit microchip numbers. If you don’t know your pet’s microchip number, you can check with your veterinarian or a pet shelter.

Puppies are the best. They’re also a lot of work.

You come home from work tired but your fur baby wants to play. With Wickedbone Smart Bone, you can choose between interactive auto-play modes or control the toy by using a virtual joystick via the app, which is available for iOS and Android.

Wickedbone Smart Bone is programmed to attract your dog’s attention. It also automatically adjusts how it reacts based on your puppy’s different actions.

As an Amazon Association, Komando.com may earn a commission from qualifying purchases made on Amazon.com

How to use new tech to track your dog or cat

GPS technology continues to grow while trackers keep getting smaller — small enough to fit on collars. So many of these trackers mentioned below operate in a similar way: You activate the tracker, download the accompanying app onto your smartphone and track your pet in real-time. But there are other options to keep your pet safe, like geo-fencing alerts and activity monitors.

Click or tap here to find a variety of GPS tracking devices for your pets.

Please share this information with everyone. Just click on any of the social media buttons on the side.

Please share this information with everyone. Just click on any of the social media buttons below.

Source link Dog Training Tips

[theinvinciblenoob]

A person with physical disabilities can’t interact with the world the same way as the able, but there’s no reason we can’t use tech to close that gap. Loro is a device that mounts to a wheelchair and offers its occupant the ability to see and interact with the people and things around them in powerful ways.

Loro’s camera and app work together to let the user see farther, read or translate writing, identify people, gesture with a laser pointer and more. They demonstrated their tech onstage today during Startup Battlefield at TechCrunch Disrupt Berlin.

Invented by a team of mostly students who gathered at Harvard’s Innovation Lab, Loro began as a simple camera for disabled people to more easily view their surroundings.

“We started this project for our friend Steve,” said Loro co-founder and creative director, Johae Song. A designer like her and others in their friend group, he was diagnosed with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, or ALS, a degenerative neural disease that paralyzes the muscles of the afflicted. “So we decided to come up with ideas of how to help people with mobility challenges.”

“We started with just the idea of a camera attached to the wheelchair, to give people a panoramic view so they can navigate easily,” explained co-founder David Hojah. “We developed from that idea after talking with mentors and experts; we did a lot of iterations, and came up with the idea to be smarter, and now it’s this platform that can do all these things.”

It’s not simple to design responsibly for a population like ALS sufferers and others with motor problems. The problems they may have in everyday life aren’t necessarily what one would think, nor are the solutions always obvious. So the Loro team determined to consult many sources and expend a great deal of time in simple observation.

“Very basic observation — just sit and watch,” Hojah said. “From that you can get ideas of what people need without even asking them specific questions.”

Others would voice specific concerns without suggesting solutions, such as a flashlight the user can direct through the camera interface.

“People didn’t say, ‘I want a flashlight,’ they said ‘I can’t get around in the dark.’ So we brainstormed and came up with the flashlight,” he said. An obvious solution in some ways, but only through observation and understanding can it be implemented well.

The focus is always on communication and independence, Song said, and users are the ones who determine what gets included.

“We brainstorm together and then go out and user test. We realize some features work, others don’t. We try to just let them play with it and see what features people use the most.”

There are assistive devices for motor-impaired people out there already, Song and Hojah acknowledged, but they’re generally expensive, unwieldy and poorly designed. Hojah’s background is in medical device design, so he knows of what he speaks.

Consequently, Loro has been designed to be as accessible as possible, with a tablet interface that can be navigated using gaze tracking (via a Tobii camera setup) or other inputs like joysticks and sip-and-puff tubes.

The camera can be directed to, for example, look behind the wheelchair so the user can safely back up. Or it can zoom in on a menu that’s difficult to see from the user’s perspective and read the items off. The laser pointer allows a user with no ability to point or gesture to signal in ways we take for granted, such as choosing a pastry from a case. Text to speech is built right in, so users don’t have to use a separate app to speak out loud.

The camera also tracks faces and can recognize them from a personal (though for now, cloud-hosted) database for people who need help tracking those with whom they interact. The best of us can lose a name or fail to place a face — honestly, I wouldn’t mind having a Loro on my shoulder during some of our events.

Right now the team is focused on finalizing the hardware; the app and capabilities are mostly finalized but the enclosure and so on need to be made production-ready. The company itself is very early-stage — they just incorporated a few months ago and worked with $100,000 in pre-seed funding to create the prototype. Next up is doing a seed round to get ready to manufacture.

“The whole team, we’re really passionate about empowering these people to be really independent, not just waiting for help from others,” Hojah said. Their driving force, he made clear, is compassion.

  [gallery ids="1752219,1752224,1752228,1752229,1752230"]

via TechCrunch

[releasesoon]

A person with physical disabilities can’t interact with the world the same way as the able, but there’s no reason we can’t use tech to close that gap. Loro is a device that mounts to a wheelchair and offers its occupant the ability to see and interact with the people and things around them in powerful ways.

Loro’s camera and app work together to let the user see farther, read or translate writing, identify people, gesture with a laser pointer and more. They demonstrated their tech onstage today during Startup Battlefield at TechCrunch Disrupt Berlin.

Invented by a team of mostly students who gathered at Harvard’s Innovation Lab, Loro began as a simple camera for disabled people to more easily view their surroundings.

“We started this project for our friend Steve,” said Loro co-founder and creative director, Johae Song. A designer like her and others in their friend group, he was diagnosed with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, or ALS, a degenerative neural disease that paralyzes the muscles of the afflicted. “So we decided to come up with ideas of how to help people with mobility challenges.”

“We started with just the idea of a camera attached to the wheelchair, to give people a panoramic view so they can navigate easily,” explained co-founder David Hojah. “We developed from that idea after talking with mentors and experts; we did a lot of iterations, and came up with the idea to be smarter, and now it’s this platform that can do all these things.”

It’s not simple to design responsibly for a population like ALS sufferers and others with motor problems. The problems they may have in everyday life aren’t necessarily what one would think, nor are the solutions always obvious. So the Loro team determined to consult many sources and expend a great deal of time in simple observation.

“Very basic observation — just sit and watch,” Hojah said. “From that you can get ideas of what people need without even asking them specific questions.”

Others would voice specific concerns without suggesting solutions, such as a flashlight the user can direct through the camera interface.

“People didn’t say, ‘I want a flashlight,’ they said ‘I can’t get around in the dark.’ So we brainstormed and came up with the flashlight,” he said. An obvious solution in some ways, but only through observation and understanding can it be implemented well.

The focus is always on communication and independence, Song said, and users are the ones who determine what gets included.

“We brainstorm together and then go out and user test. We realize some features work, others don’t. We try to just let them play with it and see what features people use the most.”

There are assistive devices for motor-impaired people out there already, Song and Hojah acknowledged, but they’re generally expensive, unwieldy and poorly designed. Hojah’s background is in medical device design, so he knows of what he speaks.

Consequently, Loro has been designed to be as accessible as possible, with a tablet interface that can be navigated using gaze tracking (via a Tobii camera setup) or other inputs like joysticks and sip-and-puff tubes.

The camera can be directed to, for example, look behind the wheelchair so the user can safely back up. Or it can zoom in on a menu that’s difficult to see from the user’s perspective and read the items off. The laser pointer allows a user with no ability to point or gesture to signal in ways we take for granted, such as choosing a pastry from a case. Text to speech is built right in, so users don’t have to use a separate app to speak out loud.

The camera also tracks faces and can recognize them from a personal (though for now, cloud-hosted) database for people who need help tracking those with whom they interact. The best of us can lose a name or fail to place a face — honestly, I wouldn’t mind having a Loro on my shoulder during some of our events.

Right now the team is focused on finalizing the hardware; the app and capabilities are mostly finalized but the enclosure and so on need to be made production-ready. The company itself is very early-stage — they just incorporated a few months ago and worked with $100,000 in pre-seed funding to create the prototype. Next up is doing a seed round to get ready to manufacture.

“The whole team, we’re really passionate about empowering these people to be really independent, not just waiting for help from others,” Hojah said. Their driving force, he made clear, is compassion.

  Source

Loro’s mounted wheelchair assistant puts high tech to work for people with disabilities A person with physical disabilities can’t interact with the world the same way as the able, but there’s no reason we can’t use tech to close that gap.

[dizzedcom]

A person with physical disabilities can’t interact with the world the same way as the able, but there’s no reason we can’t use tech to close that gap. Loro is a device that mounts to a wheelchair and offers its occupant the ability to see and interact with the people and things around them in powerful ways.

Loro’s camera and app work together to let the user see farther, read or translate writing, identify people, gesture with a laser pointer and more. They demonstrated their tech onstage today during Startup Battlefield at TechCrunch Disrupt Berlin.

Invented by a team of mostly students who gathered at Harvard’s Innovation Lab, Loro began as a simple camera for disabled people to more easily view their surroundings.

“We started this project for our friend Steve,” said Loro co-founder and creative director, Johae Song. A designer like her and others in their friend group, he was diagnosed with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, or ALS, a degenerative neural disease that paralyzes the muscles of the afflicted. “So we decided to come up with ideas of how to help people with mobility challenges.”

“We started with just the idea of a camera attached to the wheelchair, to give people a panoramic view so they can navigate easily,” explained co-founder David Hojah. “We developed from that idea after talking with mentors and experts; we did a lot of iterations, and came up with the idea to be smarter, and now it’s this platform that can do all these things.”

It’s not simple to design responsibly for a population like ALS sufferers and others with motor problems. The problems they may have in everyday life aren’t necessarily what one would think, nor are the solutions always obvious. So the Loro team determined to consult many sources and expend a great deal of time in simple observation.

“Very basic observation — just sit and watch,” Hojah said. “From that you can get ideas of what people need without even asking them specific questions.”

Others would voice specific concerns without suggesting solutions, such as a flashlight the user can direct through the camera interface.

“People didn’t say, ‘I want a flashlight,’ they said ‘I can’t get around in the dark.’ So we brainstormed and came up with the flashlight,” he said. An obvious solution in some ways, but only through observation and understanding can it be implemented well.

The focus is always on communication and independence, Song said, and users are the ones who determine what gets included.

“We brainstorm together and then go out and user test. We realize some features work, others don’t. We try to just let them play with it and see what features people use the most.”

There are assistive devices for motor-impaired people out there already, Song and Hojah acknowledged, but they’re generally expensive, unwieldy and poorly designed. Hojah’s background is in medical device design, so he knows of what he speaks.

Consequently, Loro has been designed to be as accessible as possible, with a tablet interface that can be navigated using gaze tracking (via a Tobii camera setup) or other inputs like joysticks and sip-and-puff tubes.

The camera can be directed to, for example, look behind the wheelchair so the user can safely back up. Or it can zoom in on a menu that’s difficult to see from the user’s perspective and read the items off. The laser pointer allows a user with no ability to point or gesture to signal in ways we take for granted, such as choosing a pastry from a case. Text to speech is built right in, so users don’t have to use a separate app to speak out loud.

The camera also tracks faces and can recognize them from a personal (though for now, cloud-hosted) database for people who need help tracking those with whom they interact. The best of us can lose a name or fail to place a face — honestly, I wouldn’t mind having a Loro on my shoulder during some of our events.

Right now the team is focused on finalizing the hardware; the app and capabilities are mostly finalized but the enclosure and so on need to be made production-ready. The company itself is very early-stage — they just incorporated a few months ago and worked with $100,000 in pre-seed funding to create the prototype. Next up is doing a seed round to get ready to manufacture.

“The whole team, we’re really passionate about empowering these people to be really independent, not just waiting for help from others,” Hojah said. Their driving force, he made clear, is compassion.

  Loro’s mounted wheelchair assistant puts high tech to work for people with disabilities A person with physical disabilities can’t interact with the world the same way as the able, but there’s no reason we can’t use tech to close that gap.

[fmservers]

Loro’s mounted wheelchair assistant puts high tech to work for people with disabilities

A person with physical disabilities can’t interact with the world the same way as the able, but there’s no reason we can’t use tech to close that gap. Loro is a device that mounts to a wheelchair and offers its occupant the ability to see and interact with the people and things around them in powerful ways.

Loro’s camera and app work together to let the user see farther, read or translate writing, identify people, gesture with a laser pointer and more. They demonstrated their tech onstage today during Startup Battlefield at TechCrunch Disrupt Berlin.

Invented by a team of mostly students who gathered at Harvard’s Innovation Lab, Loro began as a simple camera for disabled people to more easily view their surroundings.

“We started this project for our friend Steve,” said Loro co-founder and creative director, Johae Song. A designer like her and others in their friend group, he was diagnosed with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, or ALS, a degenerative neural disease that paralyzes the muscles of the afflicted. “So we decided to come up with ideas of how to help people with mobility challenges.”

“We started with just the idea of a camera attached to the wheelchair, to give people a panoramic view so they can navigate easily,” explained co-founder David Hojah. “We developed from that idea after talking with mentors and experts; we did a lot of iterations, and came up with the idea to be smarter, and now it’s this platform that can do all these things.”

It’s not simple to design responsibly for a population like ALS sufferers and others with motor problems. The problems they may have in everyday life aren’t necessarily what one would think, nor are the solutions always obvious. So the Loro team determined to consult many sources and expend a great deal of time in simple observation.

“Very basic observation — just sit and watch,” Hojah said. “From that you can get ideas of what people need without even asking them specific questions.”

Others would voice specific concerns without suggesting solutions, such as a flashlight the user can direct through the camera interface.

“People didn’t say, ‘I want a flashlight,’ they said ‘I can’t get around in the dark.’ So we brainstormed and came up with the flashlight,” he said. An obvious solution in some ways, but only through observation and understanding can it be implemented well.

The focus is always on communication and independence, Song said, and users are the ones who determine what gets included.

“We brainstorm together and then go out and user test. We realize some features work, others don’t. We try to just let them play with it and see what features people use the most.”

There are assistive devices for motor-impaired people out there already, Song and Hojah acknowledged, but they’re generally expensive, unwieldy and poorly designed. Hojah’s background is in medical device design, so he knows of what he speaks.

Consequently, Loro has been designed to be as accessible as possible, with a tablet interface that can be navigated using gaze tracking (via a Tobii camera setup) or other inputs like joysticks and sip-and-puff tubes.

The camera can be directed to, for example, look behind the wheelchair so the user can safely back up. Or it can zoom in on a menu that’s difficult to see from the user’s perspective and read the items off. The laser pointer allows a user with no ability to point or gesture to signal in ways we take for granted, such as choosing a pastry from a case. Text to speech is built right in, so users don’t have to use a separate app to speak out loud.

The camera also tracks faces and can recognize them from a personal (though for now, cloud-hosted) database for people who need help tracking those with whom they interact. The best of us can lose a name or fail to place a face — honestly, I wouldn’t mind having a Loro on my shoulder during some of our events.

Right now the team is focused on finalizing the hardware; the app and capabilities are mostly finalized but the enclosure and so on need to be made production-ready. The company itself is very early-stage — they just incorporated a few months ago and worked with $100,000 in pre-seed funding to create the prototype. Next up is doing a seed round to get ready to manufacture.

“The whole team, we’re really passionate about empowering these people to be really independent, not just waiting for help from others,” Hojah said. Their driving force, he made clear, is compassion.

  [gallery ids="1752219,1752224,1752228,1752229,1752230"]

Via Devin Coldewey https://techcrunch.com