No matter how unlikely, there was always bound to be someone out there who was desperate to have an iPhone that runs Android. Enter Tendigi partner and CTO – and jazz pianist – Nick Lee who designed and built a 3D printed smartphone case that lets him run Android on his iPhone. The folks at Tendigi are no strangers to messing with Apple devices, having recently found a way to get the classic Windows 95 OS to run on an Apple Watch. So Lee decided to take his tech-mixing ways to the next level and see if he could find a way to get the Google-designed open source smartphone operating system to run on its nemesis, a very much NOT open source iPhone 6 Plus.
Taking advantage of the open source nature of the Android OS, Lee used the tools from Google’s Android Open Source Project to build an app that would allow his iPhone to run using Android’s latest version, 6.0.1 Marshmallow. He started with an embedded Android HiKey development board and linked it up with a lithium-polymer battery pack with an an integrated protection circuit to prevent things like explosions and giant fireballs. Lee also needed to use a boost converter voltage regulator that would allow the battery pack’s 3.7 volts to run the HiKey. Unfortunately, there were still some hardware issues that he would need to sort out before he could get everything working.
Every Thursday is #3dthursday here at Adafruit! The DIY 3D printing community has passion and dedication for making solid objects from digital models. Recently, we have noticed electronics projects integrated with 3D printed enclosures, brackets, and sculptures, so each Thursday we celebrate and highlight these bold pioneers!
Have you considered building a 3D project around an Arduino or other microcontroller? How about printing a bracket to mount your Raspberry Pi to the back of your HD monitor? And don’t forget the countless LED projects that are possible when you are modeling your projects in 3D!
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Stop breadboarding and soldering – start making immediately! Adafruit’s Circuit Playground is jam-packed with LEDs, sensors, buttons, alligator clip pads and more. Build projects with Circuit Playground in a few minutes with the drag-and-drop MakeCode programming site, learn computer science using the CS Discoveries class on code.org, jump into CircuitPython to learn Python and hardware together, TinyGO, or even use the Arduino IDE. Circuit Playground Express is the newest and best Circuit Playground board, with support for CircuitPython, MakeCode, and Arduino. It has a powerful processor, 10 NeoPixels, mini speaker, InfraRed receive and transmit, two buttons, a switch, 14 alligator clip pads, and lots of sensors: capacitive touch, IR proximity, temperature, light, motion and sound. A whole wide world of electronics and coding is waiting for you, and it fits in the palm of your hand.
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