Slack is a relatively simple chat application with a powerfully complex set of capabilities. Case in point: Bertrand Fan’s “Slack on a SNES” project, in which the Slack engineer figured out how to load messages from a custom channel into a 1995 Nintendo game by way of a spoofed satellite transmission.
BS-X: The Story of The Town Whose Name Was Stolen was a SNES game that shipped with an accessory called the Satellaview, which was a modem peripheral for the Super Famicom (the Japanese SNES) that allowed it to receive data transmissions much in the way games are now frequently updated over the internet. Back then, however, you had to wait for Nintendo to beam some data to you. Also, the set up looked wildly complicated:
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, or even use Arduino IDE. Circuit Playground Express is the newest and best Circuit Playground board, with support for MakeCode, CircuitPython, 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.
Have an amazing project to share? The Electronics Show and Tell with Google Hangouts On-Air is every Wednesday at 7:30pm ET! To join, head over to YouTube and check out the show’s live chat – we’ll post the link there.
