If you love cables and good bargains, you should definitely check out Monoprice. Recently on Monoprice, we discovered a little $1.76 "USB Docking Station" that is a great way for making a desktop mount for blink(1). It's really just a USB extension cable on a plastic base, but that's so useful! See it on one of our desks below.
A couple of reviews of our blink(1) notification light have shown up recently in the French-speaking part of the Web. As English speakers, it's always interesting to see other languages' versions of the technical terms we use every day. French especially, see below.
And for the more command-line inclined, here's a French language version of using blink1-tool on a Raspberry Pi:
Remember, in the EU, we how have several ways to buy blink(1), including Domadoo now too.
Adrian on Twitter writes "Hoped to have some kind of wearable thing for @PrideWinnipeg, but I wasn't sure I'd have time to make something. Then I remembered I have a BlinkM." And then later: "It's a BlinkM using strips of grocery bags under 1/3 of a ping-pong ball, sandwiched between sanded plexiglass using 1/8th bolts."
Here's his wearable heart that beats the flag colors. So neat!
Here's a great way to hook up blink(1) up to Microsoft Outlook. Github user @sajingeo created a nicely-written Python script "outlook.py" that polls queries Outlook and then calls "blink1-tool". You don't need to be running Blink1Control to get this to work. (if you are, just use the "blink1control-tool" cmdline program instead of "blink1-tool"). He also includes a handy batch file to start it all off. Thanks sajingeo!
Github user @skynebula made some great AppleScript buttons for use with Blink1Control on Mac OS X. Put these in your Dock to quickly turn your blink(1) whatever color you like!
We're very excited to announce that our blink(1) USB notification LED is now available via Seeed Studio. Seeed is a wonderful company based in Shenzhen, China and helped ThingM manufacture blink(1). And since they're based in Shenzhen, they're a much closer source blink(1) from if you're places like Australia, Japan, or Singapore. Thanks Seeed!
ThingM will once again be at Maker Faire Bay Area. It's the 10-year anniversary and we've been going since the very beginning (and have had a booth there for 8 years). This year it's on May 16 & 17 2015. Come join us! We'll be showing off projects made with our blink(1) USB RGB LED and our BlinkM Smart LED family of products. If you've done something neat with ThingM products, come tell us about it. See you there!
Celebrate the colors of spring with a multi-colored blink(1) USB LED!
To welcome the coming nice weather, new plants, and allergens, blink(1)s and accessories are 15% off in the ThingM store for the entire month of April.
Visit http://buy.thingm.com/blink1 and use coupon code "blink1spring" at checkout.
Anthony made a hilarious glowing "robostache" for SXSW2015 using four BlinkMs, an Arduino, and 3d printed enclosure. As the RoboStache.com page describes:
#RoboStache is a 3D Printed faux mustache optimized for maximum visibility, interactivity and fun. The Arduino controlled, sensor fed, high bright programmable LED lit device facilitates common shared experiences amongst strangers, experiences that build trust and foster an environment for sharing ideas.
More pics on his Google+ page and the RoboStache.com homepage. Video below.
Jacob is a user of nagios, the popular server monitoring tool, and nagstamon, a nagios status monitor tray icon for the desktop. But, as he notes:
Problem is the tray icon is not that present and sometimes I don’t see the notification in time. The blink(1) is the perfect addon for this, I now can see if something is wrong even if my screen is off.
He wrote a quick wrapper script to connect blink(1) to nagios and nagstamon and now he gets visual notifications without peering at a tiny tray icon.
See video of it in action on his blog post.
He also made a great set of command-line aliases for other daily blink(1) uses:
Thanks Jacob, these are great!
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